The Difference Between Living and Surviving
by whyarenamessohard
Summary: Previously "I Never". Set after 4.12 Unable to find any other survivors Beth and Daryl head out alone and begin to learn how one can bare to live in this new world.
1. Chapter 1

**I Never**

The dry rustling of the leaves underfoot slightly slowed their progress. The sound was common in the woods these days, ever since the season changed and the trees lost their coverings. Any creature that moved caused the dry leaves to crackle and crunch underfoot and while that alerted Beth and Daryl to other creatures presence, it also it alerted those same creatures of theirs.

As such their aimless wanderings through the woods did not get them as far as they used to. In summer they would walk for tens of miles on end, the cover of the woods hiding them from the hot sun. Once the leaves fell and the cold set in they did not make it quite as far. Walking burned away the cold but the leaves only brought more walkers to them.

They had been walking through woods for years it seemed to Beth. For weeks they hunted for any sign of other survivors for the prison. They scoured the woods for tracks until their own footprints were all that could be found. By unspoken agreement they never went back to the train tracks, not after finding the remains. After a while they gave up on finding anyone else. They had to have been the only two to make it out alive and stay alive. The day they turned north, away from the prison for the last time, Beth expected to cry, to feel something about finally admitting that everyone she loved was gone. All she felt though was relief. As they trudged through woods unfamiliar to her she felt a weight lift off her now that they had finally stopped searching for people they both knew they would never find.

The days grew shorter and colder as they made their way. They stuck to the woods, both more comfortable in the trees and wilderness than they would be in a house. When they began to see their breath in the mornings they decided that they should start looking for a place to spend the winter. They went to many places: houses, stores, restaurants. None of them had been suitable enough to spend an extensive amount of time in so they kept moving through the woods. Sometimes Beth thought that the reason they didn't stay somewhere wasn't because it was to dirty or to hard to defend but because it still felt to close to the prison, the past and the ghosts they were both still running away from.

Trudging through an ankle deep pile of crumbling brown leaves Beth brushed her blonde hair out of her eyes and stared up through the tree line. The sky was a light gray, not with dusk which was hours away, but with clouds that could only mean the first snow of the year.

She was so enraptured with the sky that she nearly ran into Daryl when he stopped before her. Hand on her knife hilt she scanned the woods for walkers. Seeing none she looked up at Daryl inquisitively. He pointed to their left where straining her eyes she could just make out a flash of red.

"Barn?" she whispered.

"Could be." He muttered, turning in the direction and tightening his grip on his crossbow. "C'mon Greene."

Minutes later they crouched behind the last of the tree line and surveyed the area in front of them. A tiny red shed stood close by with a small one-story farmhouse in front of it. Acres spread out in front of it, clear of trees and overrun with dead crops that were never harvested. Beth felt a twinge at seeing so much wasted food. There were pins where animals used to be kept, empty now with a gate swinging mournfully in the breeze. Beth felt a twinge of homesickness, memories of her farm threatening to overwhelm her.

"Its clear of walkers." she whispered once she could control her voice.

Daryl looked at her, his brow crinkled. "You okay?"

Beth knew that he wasn't just asking if she was okay right now, but if she would be okay to stay the winter here. The memories were fighting hard against her mental wall, a snippet of Shawn's laughter made it through. She grabbed the laughter and tucked it lovingly behind the wall again."Its as good a place as any."

He was still staring at her, his blue eyes piercing into her as if he could smell the lie on her breath. "Let's check the inside, c'mon."

Slowly they crept towards the back porch of the house where they stopped and listened with baited breath. Minuted ticked by without any noise but their own breathing. Opening the door Daryl looked inside before beckoning Beth to follow him. As she shut the door behind them they were plunged into darkness. Daryl muttered a swear under his breath before he lit one of their few matches that he kept in his pocket. The small flame told Beth the darkness was due to the boards covering the windows. Candles rested on a table next to the door which Daryl quickly lit. Beth frowned as she took one, fighting one handed was not ideal.

She had been worried for nothing however as the small house did not take long to clear. There was only four rooms: a kitchen, bathroom, front room and bedroom. Devoid of life, living or reanimated, they were lucky enough to not have any dead bodies to clear out either.

"People must've left in a hurry." Daryl remarked as they took stock of the supplies they had now gained and he opened the kitchen cupboards on a ration of canned goods.

"You don't think people are staying here and on their way back right?" Beth asked as she shook a blanket free of dust and wrapped it around her shoulders with a shiver. The inside of the house felt even colder than outside.

"Nah, whole place is covered in dust. Ours are the only footprints, see?" Looking down she saw his point, their tracks crisscrossed over the otherwise dirty floor. "This place is pretty isolated to. First thing we've seen in days. Hard place to just stumble upon, we should be alright here." he continued, counting the cans before him.

"So." Beth questioned moving to open another cupboard and finding an assortment of boxed products, she nearly began drooling at the sight of a box of penne noodles. Grabbing them she turned to Daryl with one of the first smiles she'd worn in a while "Home sweet home?"

With a grin of his own he swiped the box from her hand. "Home sweet home."

Cooking the pasta was laborious work as they not only had to clear out the fireplace but build a hot enough fire, find a pan they could actually put in the fire, boil the water and then wait for the noodles to cook. Eating the noodles though made every instant of it worth it.

"God, I missed carbohydrates." Beth sighed contently leaning back against the armchair where Daryl sat and closing her eyes. "I could die happy right now."

Daryl snorted. "I've never missed a food so much I'd die for it."

"I never said I'd die _for _it." she said opening her eyes so she could roll them. She stared down at what was left in the ceramic bowl in her hands. "But I probably would die for these they're so good. Point for you."

"That puts me at what? Fifty-four? Damn Greene you need to catch up."

Beth slapped his shin lightly as she leaned her head against his knee and closed her eyes.

Once they left the woods around the prison they had become a quiet pair. Some of it was out of necessity, they were in unfamiliar territory and did not want to draw the attention of anything living or dead to them. Most of it was out of sadness. The duo retreated into themselves as they walked, their thoughts still at the prison with the people they were in the process of writing off as dead. They did not break this silence for over a week until they left the woods to gather supplies at a gas station they passed. Inside after scanning the shelves Beth found a shot glass pronouncing in neon letters, "South Carolina". The sight of it reminded Beth of a game of 'I never' her and Daryl had once played so she tossed it to him.

"Looks like you can't use your Georgia one anymore."

That night as they lay on the hard packed earth of the woods Beth was almost asleep when Daryl's voice broke the still air.

"I've never been to a high school football game." his voice was so quite Beth thought she imagined it. For a moment she was confused by the randomness of the statement before she remembered the shot glass and the game that it had reminded her of.

"I've never smoked a cigarette." she whispered in response before she drifted off to sleep.

And thus their silence was broken and their game began. It took a while for them to truly break out of their grief but even if they went all day without exchanging a word at the end of the night they always whispered something they had never done. After a while a points system was created. If one of them said something that the other person had not done than they lost a point. If they said something that the other had done they gained a point. On the other side, if they had done what the other person hadn't they lost a point and if they hadn't done what the other said they gained one. The highest score was the winning score.

Keeping score was a tough matter as neither bothered with writing it down and some nights they forgot to redo their tally. Either way, Daryl was constantly in the lead. Not only was he better at coming up with things he had never done he also knew how to aim them at something Beth was likely to have done. She was not so talented and the fiasco that had come after she had suggested jail was still fresh in her mind even after months had passed. She would guess more generic things that it would turn out Daryl had never done either so she was constantly losing points. At one time she had even been in the negative numbers and digging her way out of that one was painful. She would spend all day staring at Daryl's back as they moved through the woods trying to come up with something, _anything_, that would get her a point. More often than not it didn't work.

"Greene. _Greene_. Beth c'mon." Daryl's voice broke through her haze of sleep and Beth looked up at him in confusion. "We gotta secure this place for the night."

Securing the house was easy as the windows were already boarded. There were only two doors, which surprisingly still had working locks. At Beth's suggestion they moved the couch in front of one door and a table in front of the other. When Daryl argued they might need to get out in a hurry she pointed out they could always go to the other door or they could unboard a window to which he reluctantly agreed. The small window in the bathroom was big enough for them both to fit through and high up enough that a walker couldn't break into it became their escape route plan.

As the snow finally began to fall outside they decided to move the mattress from the bedroom out to place it before the fire since the house was so cold in the other rooms their breath misted out in front of them. Even though she had slept next to Daryl every night since leaving the prison, slowly getting closer as the weather grew colder, Beth had to fight off a blush as she settled down on the mattress next to him. The house was not only stockpiled on preserved foods but also on blankets so they were each wrapped in their own collection of blankets. Feeling slightly as though she was in a cocoon Beth stared at the fire in front of her, Daryl having insisted that she take that side. Whether it was the intoxicating warmth or the pleasurable feeling of a full stomach, a bed, and a night of uninterrupted sleep stretching before her Beth felt herself brave enough to admit. "I've never shared a bed with a man I'm not related to."

Daryl was silent for a moment before answering, "Point for you. I've never had someone in my life I look up to."

Her father's face in mind Beth closed her eyes. "Point for you."

The days grew even shorter and ever colder. They had stumbled upon the house at the best moment because the snow fell for two days as they settled in. Using left over snow gear in the shed (where they found a veritable gold mine of hardware, tools, farming equipment and winter gear) Daryl hunted them fresh meat to freeze as they settled in for winter. While he hunted Beth went through the seeds left in the shed and read through one of the self-help farming books she found in the house or gathered wood to use for the fire. Neither of them mentioned it but as days passed the idea of being out in the woods again grew more and more distasteful. Being able to sleep on a warm bed in front of a warm fire, with full bellies and not having to look over their shoulder every second began to shake them from their quiet cages.

Neither had been the most talkative person before the outbreak and getting used to talking at anything above a whisper took time but they began to exchange words and stories outside of their nightly 'I never'. Beth found herself telling Daryl stories she had once deemed to embarrassing to be told aloud, such as the story of her first kiss. In return he regaled her with tales of the antics he got into with his brother. As winter took force outside, growing colder everyday, inside they began to warm up to each other.

Like the previous winter the cold slowed the walkers down. Only twice in what Beth assumed to be five weeks since they got to the house, did they have a walker stumble close enough to be a threat enough to have to kill it. Daryl's assumption that the house was to isolated to be found proved correct as no living person made it through the deepening snow to them.

The short days began to drag on, filled with nothing but mundane tasks of gathering wood, water and meat. The house had only six books, which both of its new occupants read through quickly. Soon their only entertainment was each other and Beth found herself admitting more to Daryl than she had even Maggie. She told him about how much she missed her family and the group from the prison, how she used to write her own songs, they had an hour long conversation about how she wished she had tried coffee. Daryl began to open up to her more as well. He told her how sometimes he was glad the world went to shit because it was the first time in his life he felt like he could do something right, that he was worth anything. He told her how he had once dreamed of being the first person in his family to go to college but instead he never even finished high school.

She couldn't pinpoint when it had happened but at some point during their stay Beth began to look at Daryl in a different light. She began to picture his face in her head the few hours a day when he wasn't with her. She would think of excuses to touch or bump into him. She even started to have daydreams about what it would be like to run her fingers through his hair or to kiss his lips.

Sometimes she wanted to act on her desires and jump on him but she held back. Having no idea if he returned her feelings she could not bare the thought that he would reject her and she would have to spend the rest of her life(no matter how short it might be) burning with that knowledge. Slowly an idea came to her and every night as they said their 'I never' she dared herself to do it but every night she chickened out.

Finally one night as the snow and wind howled outside she couldn't take it anymore. Clutching her hands into fists in her blankets she dealt the only card she was left holding. "I've never had sex." In the silence that followed Beth pushed her embarrassment aside by congratulating her voice on not shaking. As the silence stretched on, closing her eyes in disappointment she began to understand her desire was one sided and was glad she hadn't thrown herself at him. Waiting for him to tell her she got a point she was surprised when she felt Daryl sit up behind her.

"Really?"

Her blue eyes snapped open and she rolled over to stare up at him where he lay propped up on one elbow. His brow was furrowed in either confusion or disbelief, she wasn't entirely to sure which.

"Yes really. What did you think since the world ended I'd just give it up to anyone?" Beth kept her tone light but in reality she had considered this. Jimmy had wanted to but the one time they found themselves alone on the farm she found she couldn't do it. She had always wanted to wait until marriage and at that time she still thought the walkers could be cured and the government would save them. Once she realized that no one was going to save them she gave up on the idea of marriage but the thought of giving her virginity to just anyone felt wrong. Zach had never felt right either. He tried once, in the cell, but she merely reminded him her father was only one cement wall away and there weren't closed doors on the cells. In truth she had never truly romantically cared for either boy. With Jimmy she had felt pressured to continue the relationship. They had been on a few dates before the outbreak and once it hit she felt to guilty to call it off no matter how much she wanted to. With Zach, as cruel as it seemed, she used him as a distraction. Whenever she was sad or confused by everything kissing him managed to curb her worries.

"So what, you waiting for marriage?" At first Beth thought that he was mocking her but then she realized that he wasn't smiling.

Her breath caught in her chest as she shook her head and tried to gain control over herself. "I was just waiting for the the right person."

Daryl opened his mouth to say something before he shut it again with a deepening furrow of his brow. He looked down at her, his blue eyes reflecting the fire light. "You _were_ waiting?"

Cursing her mistake Beth tried to think of a way to explain her previous statement without telling him that she would willingly give her virginity to him. Before she could come up with something Daryl leaned over and pressed his lips to hers.

Gasping into his mouth her brain went haywire at the feel of his mouth on hers. She couldn't move for a moment she was so floored by this unexpected response. She felt him begin to pull away from her and something inside clicked. Her arms wrapped around him pulling him down on top of her, her hands tangling into his hair as she tried to push some of the many blankets out of the way the need to be closer to him nearly over powering her.

Daryl seemed to be possessed by the same animalistic drive as he began to pull and shove the mess of blankets off of them. Finally free Beth felt the cold bit into her for only a brief second before Daryl's body rested over hers. Kissing him wasn't like any kiss she's ever had. He tasted like the rabbit they'd ate for dinner and the fresh snow they used for water, his beard stubble scratched against her face and it was still the best kiss she'd ever had.

Running her hands up his arms she found to her pleasure that his biceps were as hard as she had always imagined. She gasped into his mouth as his cold fingers brushed her waistline and he pulled way to tug off her shirt, leaving her bare from the waist up. His eyes roamed over her bare breasts in a way that should have made her blush but instead only made her smile. He moved to kiss her again but Beth caught his shirt in her fingers and tugged it off of him before she caught his mouth again. A shiver ran through her at the cold air but Daryl pulled one of the blankets over them, that and his warm body beat off the chill.

His hands ran over her torso slowly as though he was trying to imprint every inch of it in his mind. Her own hands moved freely over his back and chest, fingers skimming the raised tissue of numerous scars. Part of her heart ached at the feel of them but then Daryl's hand cupped her breast and a different part of her ached. His fingers rolled her nipples slightly before he pulled away from her mouth to kiss a trail down her neck. Beth twisted her hands into his hair again as he took one of her nipples into his mouth. A small moan rose from her throat as he swirled his tongue over her nipple before moving to do the same to her other breast.

As he moved back up to kiss her Beth hooked her fingers into the waist band of his jeans and pulled him closer to her. Her fingers shook slightly as she unbuttoned them and began to push them off his hips. Daryl caught her shaking hands in his own and pulled away from her.

"We don't have to do this." his pupils were blown and his voice was far from controlled yet he still looked ready to pull away at the slightest word from her.

"No, but we want to." Beth placed her hand on the back of his neck and pulled him down to her but he resisted her.

"We don't have protection." his voice held almost pain as he spoke this realization.

"I haven't had my period in three months. The likelihood of me getting pregnant is pretty rare." Beth explained leaning up to close the distance between their mouths.

"You really want to risk that?" Daryl asked lowering his head to rest against hers.

Running her fingers down his face Beth whispered, "Every breath we take is a risk."

Apparently run out of arguments Daryl kissed her again and helped her rid him of his jeans. Hers followed shortly after and she marveled at the feel of him pressing against her, even through their underwear. Kissing him slowly Beth removed his boxers, now with steady fingers. Daryl let out a hiss of breath as she wrapped her fingers around him. She had never felt a man like this before and as she moved her thumb over the tip of his penis and he let out a groan she smiled at the feel of power it gave her.

As if he sensed the change in her Daryl moved his fingers to the waistband of her underwear slipping his fingers in slowly. It was her turn to gasp as his fingers moved slow circles against her nub and slowly slipped one finger inside her. Wrapping both her arms around him she kissed him deeper as he slid her underwear off her hips and tossed them behind him at the growing pile of clothes. Positioned at her entrance Daryl moved to look down at her. She ran her fingers down his face again as she nodded.

As he slipped inside her she felt a brief sting of pain that made her bite her lip. He stilled for a moment as she adjusted to the feel of having him inside her. When she began to wriggle underneath him he bent down to kiss her again and slowly began to move inside of her.

He moved painfully slow at first, probably afraid that he was hurting her. When she whimpered for him to move faster he happily obliged. Soon they were both panting and Beth found herself glad this hadn't happened in the woods because they would surely have brought a horde of walkers down on them by now. It felt like it was over far to soon, she cried out his name and felt like she basically came unglued into his arms. He followed her not soon after having just enough sense of mind to finish on her leg and not inside her.

After cleaning themselves off they bundled their blankets together into one giant nest. Beth curled against his side as he ran his fingers through her hair. Smiling with contentment a thought occurred to her and she propped herself up on one arm to look down at him.

"I got a point for my never right?" She said with a grin.

He opened his eyes to laugh at her. "You would have if your statement was still true."

Her grin only grew. "But it was true when I said it. So I got a point right?"

Daryl rolled his eyes and leaned up to kiss her. "Yes you got a point. So now we're what, ninety-eight to thirty-six?"

"Something like that." Beth said as she settled against his chest again. "Its your turn you know."

There was a brief pause before Daryl spoke. "I've never been in love."

Beth was silent for a moment as she considered this. She had never been in love before either but she was beginning to question if she was in love now. She had always said she would give her virginity to someone she loved and she had just given it to Daryl, that meant something. Besides she told him everything without fear of judgment and laying in his arms at that moment felt like the most natural thing in the world. He made her feel safe while also making her feel that she could protect this wasn't love than she had no idea what was.

She propped herself back up on her elbow and looked down at him. "Point for you." she whispered her blue eyes searching his.

Daryl smiled and reached up to brush a strand of hair behind her ear. "Hell who am I kidding?" he whispered. "Point for you too."


	2. Chapter 2

Author's Note: Okay so I wrote this originally to be a one shot but enough people asked me to continue it that I have decided to do so. Thank you all for your feedback! I have changed the title as "I Never" no longer seemed to fit right. Enjoy!

Chapter Two

As slow as winter had seemed before he and Beth had coupled, afterward winter seemed to flash by. Days were no longer dragged on with one mind numbing chore after the other but were now filled with stolen touches and learning the different aspects to one of her smiles. The isolated farmhouse proved to be as far off the beaten track as Daryl had expected, they saw no signs of human life. Even the walkers were hard to come by at first.

As the snow began to melt the walkers began to thaw. Every few days one or two would stumble upon the house and the pair would make quick work of dispatching them. Daryl used to be okay with letting them walk on by if they weren't going to be in the way of harming them or bringing more to them. What convinced him to end their death, life, whatever the hell it was, was Beth's instance that she would never want to end up like that.

It was never like the time he tried to teach her how to use the crossbow, if that could even be called teaching. They did not do it out of malicious intent, it was a solemn affair stabbing the decaying creature through the head. There was one close call when Beth slipped on some ice and brought the walker down on top of her. In the seconds before his cross bolt went through the walkers head Daryl felt his heart threaten to stop beating.

It was strange, being with Beth. His whole life he had never had a steady female in his life. His mother was never exactly a role model and once she died he only saw a string of his father's 'girlfriends'. As he grew older he went through his own fair share of girls, always searching for someone or something to make him feel at ease.

He had thought he had found it with Carol but as time passed he found he only cared for her as a friend, a good friend, but he could not find it in him to string along women like he used to. He enjoyed her company though, she was easy to get along with as were all the women in the prison group. He had always segregated himself from the women though. He wasn't always comfortable being around them as they were not like the doped up girls from his past. When Beth and him had fled the prison he had been terrified out of his mind the first time she had cried not knowing how to comfort the clearly heartbroken teenage girl.

But as time passed, and as Beth was not the type of person to stand by and watch him drown in sadness, he became more comfortable around her. Hell, he was in love with her. Realizing that had been almost as startling as the first time she hugged him.

As they began to explore each other and the house heated up, outside the world heated up with them. When the last of the snow melted they decided to continue staying at the farmhouse, neither of them ready to leave its sanctuary for the uncertain world outside its boarders. Beth put her farming knowledge to use and began planting seeds that had been left over by the previous owner and Daryl began building a better perimeter fence. It was easier now that the ground was no longer frozen solid.

The ease with which they fell into their new life felt like it ought to surprise him but he felt as though he had been waiting forever to find this girl.

One night they sat outside on the front porch in the warm spring air. Daryl sat on the top porch step Beth on the one below him leaning back against his chest as he worked his fingers through the tangles in her long blonde hair.

Beth was frowning in concentration as she stared out at the clear land before them. "I've never." she paused, biting her lip, clearly not sure what to say. She was so bad at the game that it was almost funny watching her think of things. "Driven a motorcycle." she finally declared happily.

Daryl snorted and rolled his eyes. "Point for you." he grumbled wrapping his arm around her and pulling her tighter to his chest. "Have you ever ridden one?" he asked curiously as she settled against him. Beth shook her head, her blonde ponytail hitting him lightly in the face.

"No. What's it like?" she asked tilting her head back to look up at him.

He paused for a moment to think of a description. He was not as good with words as she was. She could describe places he had never been to so well he could close his eyes and not only see them but smell and hear them as well.

"Its loud." he said finally. "There's nothing between you and the road so there's a bit of fear to it at first. Its." he paused searching for the right word. "Freeing." he settled on finally.

Beth leaned her head against his chest again. "So its a bit like riding a horse?"

Daryl shrugged. "Not really. You have complete control over the motorcycle. Not so with a horse." he explained.

"Oh. I'd like to ride a motorcycle one day." she yawned suddenly and rested her arms on his knees. He took her hair in his hands again and began to play with it as they sat in companionable silence and watched the sun set before them.

Daryl stared out contently at the land that they were slowly making their own. They could live there for years and be able to keep themselves fed off the land. There was a creek not to far away where they got fresh water. Hell, they even manged to bathe once a week by heating up the creek water. The first time they did that they were both so giddy with being clean that Daryl had said fuck it to his rule of them not having sex without protection and he took her on the kitchen table twice.

As much as he hated being responsible he knew that they could not go around having unprotected sex all the time without consequences. The morning after they first had sex, made love, whatever you wanted to call it, he told Beth they couldn't do that again.

Her face had paled and she clutched the bed sheet tight to her naked chest. He immediately back tracked his words explaining that it wasn't because he didn't want to, cause hell he pretty much always wanted to, or because he didn't think of her like that but because they couldn't risk her getting pregnant. She had protested but he was adamant. When he explained to her that they could still do other things she had huffed and said, "Like what?"

He had smirked so widely at her question before he bent over to kiss her that thinking about it made his face hurt. Teaching her the different ways a body could move with another was his favorite way to pass the time. The first time that he had kissed her between her legs she had been so nervous her hands kept fluttering around like small birds. At the feel of his tongue on her she had moved her hands to his hair with a gasp. Of course, the first time she went down on him he had been no better and came into her mouth with her name on his lips.

She didn't get her period for a few weeks after they had sex and he spent each day trying to work up the courage to ask her if she got it while worrying about what the hell they'd do if she did get pregnant. The day she finally got it he almost melted with relief that they would not have to worry about that yet.

"We should head on inside." he said as the last rays of the sunset disappeared beyond the horizon. Beth lifted her head from his chest where she had been half asleep already and rose to her feet. Daryl clambered up behind her and they did one last scan of the area around the house before heading inside again. Daryl thought he heard something rustle in the trees to his left but seeing nothing he followed her inside. Shutting and locking the front door they slid the couch back in front of it. The house secure for the night Beth slipped off her shoes and slid her jacket off her shoulders.

Daryl stepped forward and placed his hands on her upper arms. Bending down he kissed the pulse point of her neck and slipped the collar of her shirt down to bare her shoulder. Smiling she turned to face him and pulled her t-shirt over her head. Placing his hands on her hips he pulled her closer to him and bent his head to hers, catching her mouth with his own. Her hands gripped his shoulders and he put his hands on her ass and lifted her up. As she wrapped her legs around his waist a gunshot suddenly rang outside.

They pulled away from each other with a gasp and a wild eyed look. He put her back on the ground and she scooped her shirt off the floor. As she shoved her feet into her boots and pulled the shirt over her head Daryl grabbed his crossbow and went to the window to peer through the cracks in the boards. Beth went around the house blowing out the candles. As he peered through the small crack into the darkening night he managed to make out at least five figures at the edge of the woods. All were armed, all were male. He cursed under his breath. They were outnumbered in both people and weapons. They had the advantage being in the house. If he was alone he would have made a stand and killed the men if they came any close. But he wasn't alone.

He looked over his shoulder at Beth who huddled behind him, gun in hand, a look of terror on her face just visible in the shallow moonlight. "Pack some food." he whispered to her. "We're leaving."

A look of pain crossed her face but she nodded and did as he told her. Within minutes she was behind him again this time a pack on her shoulders. The men were now approaching the back door of the house.

"We're going out the bathroom." he said swinging his crossbow onto his shoulder and shepherding her ahead of him. As he locked the bathroom door behind him he heard the men begin to pound on the door to the house.

"Maybe we should talk to them." Beth whispered as he eased the window open and motioned her forward.

He looked down at her and felt his heart both break and soar at her innocence and trust of people. "Best not risk it." he whispered back.

He waited until the men circled to the front of door of the house before helping Beth ease out the window and the few feet down to the ground outside. He hated making her go out first when the men could circle back and see her at any time but he wasn't about to let her wait in the house either. Just as he slipped through the window the front door crashed open to cheers. Daryl grabbed Beth's hand and they sprinted to the woods.

They tore through the woods as quickly and quietly as they could for several minutes. Finally Daryl decided that they were far enough away and they ground to a halt. Beth placed her hands on her hips and stared up at him, her breath ragged and her blue eyes fierce. He felt almost guilty under her questioning gaze.

"We couldn't risk it." he finally whispered buckling under the pressure of her eyes. "It was a group of five men. No women. Who knows what they would have done to you." he explained his blood boiling hot at the mere thought of someone laying a hand on her.

Beth's angry blue eyes softened. "I can take care of myself Daryl." she whispered gently placing a hand on his arm.

He nodded and ran a hand through his hair. "I know that. I just." he paused unsure of how to continue.

"Its okay." Beth whispered stepping closer to him as if she knew the words he couldn't seem to find.

Daryl shook his head. They had just lost their first home since the prison. The first place in a long time he truly felt like he belonged. All the happy memories of the farmhouse that had been their own for the past few months filled his head. They had lost their home to someone else, again. Daryl wondered if they would ever have a place to call their own, a place where they could be safe.

"Hey." Beth put her hand on his chin and forced his eyes to look down at her calm face. "It'll be okay." she smiled up at him sadly. "We still have each other."

He pulled her to his side in a hug and surveyed the unfamiliar territory around them. "That we do." he agreed in a whisper. Sighing he let go of her, pulling his crossbow into his arms again and stepping forward into the night. "C'mon Greene. We've got ourselves a new home to find."


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter Three

Beth squinted in the glare as the sun finally broke over the tree line. The bright light of it made her blink as spots swam in her vision and she looked back to to the floor of the woods as she and Daryl made their way through it. They had not stopped the night before except for a few minutes at a time to rest. She did not know what was possessing him to keep going like they were but he had fallen into a silence. She only hoped it wouldn't be as bad as his silence when the prison had been destroyed. That silence had nearly destroyed them both.

The unfamiliar woods around her seemed never ending as they walked in silence. She was beginning to wonder if these woods would ever end or if they would continue to go in circles around them the way they used to go in circles around each other.

"Are you okay?" Beth finally asked unable to stand the silence any longer. Her mind kept flashing back to the weeks when Daryl shut her out. She did not want to have to set another house on fire to get him to speak to her.

Daryl looked back at her over his shoulder. "Just tired of running." he admitted before turning forward.

"We could stop you know. Camp out in the woods somewhere." The idea was no more appealing to her now than it was before winter but at that point she would have suggested they live in a doghouse if it kept him from shutting her out.

"Woods ain't safe forever." Daryl said gruffly. She knew he was thinking of the farmhouse they had just left behind. Part of her hated the men for taking it from them and a small part of her wished that Daryl would have at least let them try to talk to them. She knew why he hadn't and she was grateful for it. But already she missed the idea of a home.

"So where are we going then?" she asked a few minutes later as she untangled her foot from a tree root. Daryl stopped and held onto her arm so she could kick herself free. Beth smiled up at him gratefully before he turned from her.

"Dunno yet. But we're gonna find us someplace safe." He fell back into his silence after that. Beth just hoped it was because he was thinking of where to go and not because he was in the process of shutting her out.

That night they slept in shifts on the floor of the forest on a small hill. The air still held a chill and Beth had not had time or the thought to pack them any blankets. Instead they curled up close and took turns guarding throughout the night. Only one walker stumbled upon them but Beth put it down quick enough. They rose at dawn the next morning and continued on their way. Already the never ending trees grated on Beth's nerves. She was beginning to wonder if they would ever find a town when they stumbled out onto a hiking trail. Exchanging a look Beth and Daryl went back into the trees and continued along the length of the path horizontal to it. They passed a group of walkers feasting on a deer and with four quick shots from Daryl's crossbow later where on their way again. Beth tried to clean the blood off the bolts as they walked but it was no use.

A few minutes later Beth saw a sign at the side of the path and darted out to it Daryl holding his crossbow ready as she read it and came back to him.

"Its says Lake Greenwood Recreation Area two miles." she explained looking at him hopefully. Daryl frowned and looked up at the clear sky and then around him at the calm woods. "Works for now." he said with a shrug and they continued on their way still staying off the path. No reason to make it easier for walkers or humans to see them.

Two miles later they stumbled out into a camp ground, a large building to their right. A large lake was behind it with picnic shelters and other camp ground features. Quickly yhey went to the door of the building, the sign out front boasting, "The Drumond Center." Carefully they went up the steps and peered through the dusty windows at the cluttered mess inside. The few walkers from the camp ground had spotted them and began to turn their way as Daryl stopped at the busted door hanging from its hinges and knocked on the door frame. Beth pulled her knife out and waited. A moment later two walkers stepped into the large front room, Daryl moved to go inside but Beth quickly grabbed his arm and pointed. Five more walkers had started out to. Daryl cursed before he jumped down the steps pulling Beth after him.

They sprinted across the flat overgrown grass back into the trees. They had barely made it in before a walker from the camp grounds was reaching for them, Daryl swung his knife at it and it went down. A crash behind them showed Beth the walkers in the building had got the door open. They kept running a look over their shoulder showing that the horde was still coming after them, breaking apart into smaller groups as the trees forced them. Their loud growls and the crash of Beth and Daryl sprinting through the trees drew other walkers to their presence. Beth's breath was coming in pants more from fear than actual exertion though she had not ran this far or this fast in a long time. Seeing a break in the tree line to their right Daryl darted though it motioning Beth to do the same. They were now on the flat sandy shore leading to the lake. They were able to run faster now but the walkers were also able to see them easier turning from the woods to follow them on the sands. The lake to their side eventually lowered into a river. Both of them were breathing heavily when Daryl looked over his shoulder at the nearly thirty walkers on their tail and the four more who had just broke through the trees in front of them.

"Can you swim?" he barked out as he came to a halt. Beth nodded and put her hands on her knees, bending double in a desperate attempt to catch her breath. "Let's go." he said grabbing her arm and turning her to the water. They sloshed through the churning waters. Beth shivered as it crossed up over her boots and began to stick her jeans to her legs. She gasped as the bottom dropped out from beneath her and she sank in past her head. The shock of the water froze her for a moment before she pushed herself back up to the surface. She broke the water line with a gasp and began swimming after Daryl who was already several feet in front of her. Her teeth began to chatter as they swam at a diagonal to the opposite shore, the rivers currents trying to tug them in different directions.

About ten feet from the opposite shore the rushing waters pushed her into a floating log she had been trying to avoid. She yelped when she hit it painfully and hung on to it for a second to catch her breath. As she moved to push off of it the exposed skin of her wrist caught on a large splinter and tore open. Cursing she shoved away from the log and made for the shore which Daryl was now scrambling up on.

The log had drifted her farther out but she pushed forward until she thought she could put her feet down. Cautiously she dropped her feet expecting for them to meet with the soft mud of the river bottom. Instead she felt something close around her ankle. She let out a shriek that was abruptly cut off as she was pulled underwater. Cold water flooded her open mouth and she opened her eyes to peer though the dirty waters. A walker was stuck in the muddy bottom, tangled on its back in reeds. One decayed hand was caught tight around Beth's boot, the other arm ended at the elbow. It tugged at her mercilessly, straining its jaw in her direction. Beth kicked her leg desperately but it would not loosen its hold. She aimed her other leg at its head and began kicking at it as hard as she could while she fumbled for her knife but the force of the water slowed her kicks down. Her fingers were too cold to undo the clasp on her knife sheath and she felt her lungs beginning to grow sore. Desperately she fumbled open the clasp and had just got her hand on the hilt when something grabbed her under her arms and yanked her free of the walker.

As her head broke over the surface she gasped for air only to begin coughing on dirty lake water. For seconds she could not breath and she was terrified she was going to drown out of water. She was dragged backwards through the sallow waters until she was dropped on the shoreline. She looked up with tears in her eyes, from both the pain in her chest and the fear, and met Daryl's panic-stricken look as he pounded on her back. Lurching forward she vomited up her meager breakfast and what felt like gallon of lake water. After she managed to suck in a lungful of air.

Beth's fingers dug into the mud around her as she began taking long gulps of air, never had she felt anything so sweet.

"You're okay." Daryl said rubbing her back between her shoulder blades. "You're okay."

When it finally sounded like he wasn't saying it as a question and she thought her legs would hold her Beth slowly made to get to her feet. Daryl scrambled up first and reached down to help her. She looked up to thank him and saw that his face had gone white. He had let go of her wrist and was staring at the blood on his hand.

"Beth." he whispered, looking up at her. Never before had she seen someone look as terrified as he did right then, or to be in as much pain. Even when she had been holding Patricia's hand and she had been attacked she hadn't looked to be as hurt as Daryl was right then. She realized suddenly what he had to be thinking.

"Its not a scratch. Well not a walker scratch." She rolled up her sopping jacket sleeve. "I cut my wrist on that log out there." she pointed, Daryl didn't tear his eyes away from her to look. Slowly she grabbed his hands which were as cold as hers. "Daryl I promise you. It didn't scratch me." she looked up at him, her blue eyes earnest until he finally nodded. A smile formed on her lips when he suddenly pulled her to him in a bone crushing hug. The tightness of his hold on her made her realize even more than his eyes how afraid he had just been.

Unfortunately his hug had her facing the direction of the river. "They're trying to cross." she said softly. There was a brief pause before Daryl let her go.

"They won't make it." he looked over his shoulder as the walkers took to the river stumbling in it until falling or being rushed over. He bent to grab his crossbow off the bank where he had dropped it to dive in after her. "We should keep moving."

Beth nodded with a shiver and started after him. He reached down for one second to squeeze her hand.

"We need to get that cut cleaned." he said letting go and heading into the tree line casting a quick glance in either direction.

"We need to get our clothes dry to before we get sick." her teeth were already beginning to chatter as she crossed her arms over her chest. Water dripped off their clothing onto the floor with the soft pattering sound of raindrops.

"Looks like were gonna have to head into a town then. Needed some supplies anyway." Daryl frowned at the notion. Town trips were never a fun affair. More walkers, more dangers, more worries but ultimately more rewards.

Stepping forward Beth nudged him gently before grabbing her knife and taking the lead. "Don't worry. We'll find something."


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter Four

It took them close to two shivering hours to find a place to stay for the night. In the two hours their clothes managed to stick themselves to their bodies like a second skin. Daryl could feel his skin chaffing against the wet material of his jeans but not a single part of him felt a complaint as he stared ahead of him at the small determined woman leading their way through the thinning trees.

Looking at her his heart began to pound in his chest again, although not quite to the extent it had when he heard her cut off scream at the river. His heart had reacted like his ribcage was made out of glass and it was hell bent on breaking it.

Thankfully he had got her away from that walker(floater? Drifter? Walker didn't really seem to apply in this one's case)in time. When he saw the scratch on her wrist though he had been so sure that it had all been for nothing. Daryl knew they were already living on numbered days but he had been so sure in that moment that those numbers had been officially cut short. He was staring down a dark and bleak tunnel that was filled with nothing but himself and the risen dead. He was so sure in that moment that he would be alone. They might be able to get two hell maybe even three days before the fever burned Beth out, but after that? It would only be him. It would only ever be him and whatever ghost of a memory he was able to save of her.

To say that he felt relief when she told him it was only a scratch from a tree branch would be akin to saying that Mount Everest was a bit big. He had never felt a feeling so sweet. After losing so many people it was nice to just once be the winners.

"There's a few houses up ahead." Beth whispered between chattering teeth, pointing forward with her knife in hand. They were at the edge of the treeline. Before them several large two story houses lay in a uniform cluster of big suburb houses. The kind of houses Merle used to break into for fun. They were at the top of a small hill, after the houses was an incline that left the space beyond out of their line of sight. There was a few walkers stumbling around the street before them and there was a few more on their trail still. You didn't get to wander through the woods without drawing some attention to yourself.

Daryl nodded and made sure his crossbow was loaded(a ridiculous precaution as it was always loaded) before pointing to the closest house. Quickly they darted to the first of the houses, dodging around an in ground pool that was still half full with water and general debris. A thick layer of dead leaves floated on top of it like a scab. They sprinted up the wooden staircase of the house's deck and made their way to the sliding glass door leading to the rest of the house. Cautiously Daryl knocked against the frame while Beth watched out behind them. A few minutes passed and nothing came to the door of the house. The walkers on the street had been distracted by the strong breeze that had started up, rattling a collection of wind chimes on the house at the other end of the block and making both of them shiver harder.

Slowly Daryl slid the door open, Beth following close behind. The house was huge and filled with light from its many unbarred windows. This was as much like their tiny farmhouse in the woods as a porcupine was like a grizzly bear. Making sure the house was clear took them ten minutes, it could have been half that but Daryl was not willing to let Beth go alone. Thankfully there was nothing living or dead in the house but them. The owners had to have left in a hurry and the place was to far out to have been raided yet as the kitchen was stocked as were the two bathroom's medicine cabinets.

Stripping out of their wet clothes took a bit of work as they had seemed to become attached to their skin. Eventually they managed and used some of the thick towels in the bathroom to dry their frozen and numb bodies. Beth sat on the counter before him, wrapped in a towel, as Daryl went to work cleaning the cut on her wrist. It was deeper than he had originally noticed as he had been unable to see much of anything past his first bout of terror. Thankfully it was not deep enough to need stitches as he had never learned to sew and he doubted Beth would be able to stitch up her own skin one handed. He insisted on cleaning it out, sure that the lake water would get it infected. Once her wrist was bandaged in white gauze Beth looked up at him with her wide blue eyes.

"Thank you." she whispered with a smile.

"I've never been so scared in my whole life." he admitted suddenly tugging on the braid she always kept in her ponytail and leaning down to rest his forehead on hers.

"I've never been so grateful in my whole life." She retorted reaching out and running her still chilled fingers down his face. "I don't know what I would do without you." she admitted on a whispered breath.

That was all it took for him to lose what little control he had left.

His mouth was on hers before she could even finish her sentence, his arms wrapped tight around her small frame to pull her as close to him as possible. Her fingers tangled into his hair as she dropped her legs open allowing him to step inside of them. Their kissing was not the sweet tremor of their usual embrace nor was it simply a lustful desire fueling them. Beth clung to him like he was a life raft and in turn he kissed her with a desperation that he had never felt for another person.

Her damp hair brushed against his arms and she shivered as he pulled the towel from her body his already pooled on the linoleum floor. Needing her like he needed oxygen he slipped inside her, causing her to gasp against his mouth and wrap her legs around his waist. The tight feel of her around him almost sent him over the edge immediately but he resisted. He moved one hand to her hip to hold her steady as he moved inside her. His tongue was in her mouth and his arms were around her body and _she was still alive._ Nothing else mattered at that moment. The only thing in the world he cared about was safe. In that moment everything was Beth, Beth, Beth. He didn't even realize that he was saying her name against her lips, whispering it into her mouth like it was a promise.

He heard her when she moaned his name and as she began to clench around him he came with a jerk and a moan, not evening having the presence of mind to pull out of her first. He knew he should worry about that, should panic about the chance of her getting pregnant. But instead all he could think about was how good it felt to stay inside her.

Beth pulled away from where she had collapsed against his chest to smile up at him. He slipped out of her with a groan and as he handed her a towel to clean off with she kissed the tip of his nose.

Later that night, encased in new warm clothes that had been the previous owners they lay stretched out on the large bed. Daryl had never laid on anything so soft, add that in with a full stomach, warm clothes and Beth in his arms and he never wanted to move again. Unfortunately he hadn't been lulled into such a sense of security to think that was an option.

"We can't stay here." he whispered into Beth's ear. They lay on their sides, his arms wrapped tight around her, pressing her into his chest, their legs tangled together. Beth twisted her neck up to look at him. "Its to obvious of a place to loot." he explained, moving his arm to brush a chunk of blonde hair out of her eyes where it had fallen.

"It hasn't been looted yet." she argued, her voice soft.

Daryl sighed into her hair. He wanted to never leave this bed. All he wanted was to stay here and hold Beth forever. But he knew he had to do what he must to keep her safe. "Even if we wanted to stay here, this house has so many windows. So many entry points. We'd never be safe here."

She dropped her head against his chest with a sigh. Her arms tightened around him. "As long as we're together I don't care where we are." she whispered into the black sweater he had stolen from the closet.

He wound his fingers through a lock of her hair. He wondered what on earth she could see in a man such as him. He didn't even try to kid himself into thinking they would have been together if the world hadn't ended. She was to good for him, to pure, to innocent. But that only made him want her more. Some sick part of him thought he wanted her because he had no other options but he had realized long before the farmhouse that he wanted her because she made him feel happy. She made him think that there was something worth living for in this world. Beth was like a drug to him, like bottled sunshine and hope. Daryl would do anything for the woman laying in his arms and that knowledge made him almost nauseous. He hardly knew what he was about to say before it tumbled past his lips.

"I love you." It came out muffled, spoken in a whisper into her hair. Although Daryl had never spent to much time thinking over a way to define what he felt for Beth he knew as soon as the words were out that it was true. She stiffened in his arms and pulled back to look up into his eyes.

"I love you too." Those were the four best words he had ever heard in his life and thoughts of leaving the house were put aside as the couple lost themselves to each other.

Afterwards they wrapped around each other in the dark under the blankets. The flame from the single candle they had lit flickered steadily in the otherwise black room.

"Where do you want to go?" Beth asked, her sweet voice filling the darkness.

Daryl lifted his head from the pillow to look down at her in confusion. "Anywhere. Don't really know the area but we'll find something."

Beth shook her head, blonde hair fanning around her. "We should have a destination. All this trekking aimlessly through the woods is driving me crazy."

He opened his mouth to argue that the woods were safer as it was easier to lose a walker and there was less people but she was suddenly pulling from his arms and leaning over the side of the bed. He heard her digging for something in their scattered clothing before she leaned back something small in her hand.

"I found this when I was emptying the bag out." she explained as she settled against him. "I figured any destination was better than no destination at all."

The candle light flickered off the shining silver spoon laying flat in her palm. In the light of the dancing flame Daryl could just make out the shape of the white house and the words "The Capitol, Washington DC."


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter Five

The cluster of houses sat on the top of a small crest of a hill looking down on a moderately sized city. This was both a good and bad thing. Bad because there were walkers stumbling around in every direction but good because they were making enough noise themselves that any small noises Beth and Daryl made on their hunt for a working car often went overlooked. There were enough cars lying around that finding one that worked enough to get them a reasonable distance was easy. However, finding enough gas to actually use the car took them over half of the day.

Beth stood keeping watch, crossbow held up at the ready, as Daryl lay half in the car on the driver's seat his hands tangled in the wires under the dash. Her mind was filled with questions to ask about where he'd learned that skill and why but it was mostly just idle curiosity. She could feel no ire at the skill that might one day save their lives. If anything it was certainly making things easier for them now.

"Got it." Daryl grunted as the car engine came to life. Beth did not remember a car ever sounding that loud in her whole life, not even Otis's blue pick-up before he fixed the muffler. She darted around to the passenger side nervously as every walker nearby turned themselves in the direction of the purring car. The second she slid onto the car's sun bleached interior Daryl was moving the car in reverse through the assorted debris and various other abandoned automobiles clustered on the road. She slammed the door shut and pulled the seat-belt on out of a habit she found herself surprised to still have. Daryl rose an eyebrow at her as he flipped the car to face forward as they cleared the debris.

"Safety first." she said with a shrug. Daryl didn't respond but from the corner of her eye she saw him pull his own seat belt down across his chest and fasten it. She turned to look out the dusty window biting down on a smile.

Being in a car again felt strange. Getting out of the city limits took some maneuvering around the shambling corpses and they had a few close calls where they had to suddenly turn or back out of a road that was overrun. Daryl was as good of a driver as he was a crazy driver and they managed to get out of the city and onto a small two lane highway without much mishap. Flexing her fingers which were stiff from maintaining their grip on the safety bar Beth watched the trees flash past the window with a strange feeling of melancholy.

"I've never driven a car." she spoke suddenly, breaking the comfortable silence that had fallen since they entered the automobile. Beth turned her neck letting her head rest against the head rest as she gazed at Daryl who lounged in the driver's seat with one hand on the wheel the other resting lightly on her knee. He looked at her sideways as he drummed his fingers lightly on the skin of her knee showing though the hole in her worn jeans.

"Point. Cheater." she smiled widely at him which only got her a snort in return as he faced the empty road before them. "Didn't you grow up on a farm?" Daryl rose his eyebrows at her as she ran her hand over his lightly.

"I didn't say I never learned to _drive_. Just that I've never driven a _car._" Beth explained farther. She shrugged as he furrowed his brow in confusion. "Daddy and Shawn taught me to drive the summer I turned thirteen." She sucked on her bottom lip a moment as she debated whether to continue. She didn't really like the sound of silence no matter how comfortable it was. "Mama didn't want them to teach me. She thought I was way to young to learn. I think she thought teaching me to drive would make me leave the farm faster and she wasn't ready to let go of me in any way just yet." Her fingers tightened on Daryl's callused hand. Slowly he flipped his hand over and she slid her smaller hand into his. As his finger's tightened on her she felt the words burning at the back of her throat until she let them out. "Mama and Maggie were out shopping in Atlanta when they taught me. Put me in Otis's pickup and set me loose in the fields. I thought I was going to crush half the harvest." a sad smile tugged at the corner of her lips.

Beth turned her head to stare out the window but it wasn't the scenery outside that she was seeing. Her mind was trapped in the memory of a life that was so much easier than the one she found herself living now. "When we got back to the farmhouse that night and Mama saw me pull up she got so mad. I swear her face turned bright red. Daddy said smoke was sure to come out of her ears if we didn't get up to the porch right away." unexpectedly a laugh escaped her at the memory. "When she saw me hop out of the driver's seat she looked so ready to be angry but then Maggie came rushing out of the house and just started hollering that she'd wanted to be the one to teach me." Tears formed in her eyes at the thought of her sister. It was the not knowing what had happened to her that hurt the worst. She held onto the hope that somewhere Maggie and Glenn were together and safe with all of her heart. It was was of the few things that helped her sleep at night. "After that they let me drive the pickup on the farm but I never had a chance to get my license. I didn't turn sixteen until a few days, well, _after_."

Beth rested her head on the head rest and stared forward. The barren road stretched on before them lit up by the lowering sun. A silence descended on the car. She was surprised that it was still not uncomfortable but she was beginning to realize that nothing was uncomfortable between them anymore. She supposed that when you loved someone you were allowed to tell them silly stories, memories that now hurt, and they wouldn't question why you told them. The person you loved would just, listen.

Daryl drummed his fingers against the steering wheel tunelessly. "Merle taught me." he offered shrugging as she looked over at him. "Burst into the house one day and dragged me out to the street to this shiny new Mustang. Pushed me in the front seat and made me drive on the back streets out of town for hours." A look of sadness passed over his face so quickly Beth almost thought she had imagined it. He never mentioned his brother expect at night when it was so dark she couldn't see the pain it obviously caused him. Merle was the only family Daryl had ever really loved. Daryl turned suddenly to face her. "Course he didn't tell me until after that he had stolen the car."

Beth laughed as Daryl grinned and settled back into the seat. "Merle's the one who taught me how to hot wire." he explained.

"I was wondering about that." Beth said with a grin, pulling her legs up on the seat underneath her.

He nodded letting his own memories take him over. "We used to street race but we never owned a good enough car." he explained. "So we'd hot-wire any nice or fast looking car we could find and use them instead. I never got caught but one night Merle did. He'd just turned eighteen. Got him his first prison sentence, eighteen months." Daryl frowned before shaking his head. "Damn brother of mine was always getting caught in the wrong place."

The look of sadness was back on his face. Beth tightened her grip on his hand before raising his knuckles to her lips. "I'm sorry." she whispered against his fist. He let out a breath before shrugging.

"There any CDs in here?" Beth didn't comment on the obvious subject change as she searched the floorboards and the glove box. She manged to scrounge up three CDs which she held out in her hands.

"Looks like we've got 'Road-trip Songs for Infants', 'Ocean Sounds', and 'Relaxing Scottish Melodies.'"

Daryl made a disgruntled face at her. "Maybe you should just sing." Rolling down the window he grabbed the CDs from her hands. Before she could protest he threw them outside. Turning she watched them hit the pavement and shatter. "I never get tired of your singing."he admitted softly.

Beth turned back to smile at him. "Are you trying to get a point for that?"

"No. Its just a fact." he was wearing the pained expression he often got when things got more personal than he seemed to be comfortable with. Leaning back against the seat again Beth licked her lips and scoured her brain for a song. She had never sung a song for Daryl before and the thought of it made her unexpectedly nervous. Sure she had sung songs _around_ him before but that was different. They hadn't been directed at him. A favorite song of her mother's came to her suddenly and she ran her thumb lightly over the back of Daryl's hand as she began to sing.

"When the rain is blowing in your face and the whole world is on your case, I could offer you a warm embrace to make you feel my love." She found herself unable to look at him as she sang. Her voice came out shaky at first but by the time she reached the end it had steadied. As she finished the song she finally looked up from their entwined hands. "I've never sang a love song to someone before that." she admitted shyly.

Daryl squeezed her hand lightly. "Me neither." she looked up at him with a small hopeful smile and he chuckled shaking his head. "And I ain't about to break that one. My voice ain't anything you want to hear."

Beth grinned wider and nudged his shoulder lightly. "Aw c'mon. I sang to you." she tried to bat her eyes at him, a trick Maggie would use on their father to get what she wanted but Daryl seemed to be immune to it or she didn't do it right as he merely laughed at her again.

"You're singing was great." he said softly. "Which is exactly why I won't be singing to you. Ever."

Beth removed her hand from his to slouch back in the seat with her arms crossed. Pretending to be upset she pouted. "Why tell each other things we've never done if we don't try to do them afterwards?"

She meant it as a joke but it was met with silence. Sitting up straight she looked over at Daryl who had the crease between his eyebrows that usually meant he was thinking something over.

Suddenly he slowed the car to a stop and shifted into park. The suddenness of it made Beth brace herself against the dashboard as she was thrown forward against her seat belt.

"Daryl I was just kidding." she said softly unsure of what he was doing. He looked up at her and reached over to unbuckle her seat belt before undoing his own.

"Let's go Greene." he said opening the door and stepping out. Beth blinked in surprise before scrambling out of her own door."Go where?" she asked as Daryl made his way to her side of the car.

"You're driving." he explained as he walked behind her to slide into the passenger seat. Quickly she darted around the front of the car and buckled herself into the driver's seat. A walker on the edge of the road had turned to trudge in their direction. Beth eyed it once before turning to face Daryl who was lounging back in the seat.

Beth looked at him and rose an eyebrow to ask for an explanation. Daryl merely shrugged in response. "What's the point of saying things we've never done if we don't try to do them." he said, the barest hint of a small smile on his lips. A grin broke across her face as she shifted the car into drive.

"You're just worried I'm catching up on points right?"

AN- The line Beth sings is from 'Make You Feel My Love' by Adele.


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter Six

"I spy..."Beth sucked on her lower lip as she looked around the empty road they walked on. The asphalt underneath their boots was cracked and threatened to trip them with every step. The area surrounding the road wasn't much to look at either, just another endless expanse of trees that might as well be never ending. "Something yellow." she beamed triumphantly at him.

Daryl shifted the strap of the back pack up higher and looked around him. The trees were still forming their summer leaves but those were a bright green that mocked him with the knowledge that they wouldn't last past the season. Sometimes he wondered if he would make it past this season of his life. The sides of the small two lane road were empty. No trash, no litter and unfortunately no abandoned cars. They had run out of gas early morning the past day and had been forced to abandon their car as there was no gas station within miles. The few cars they had come up upon had all been unusable; all had empty gas tanks and one had three flat tires as well. Neither Daryl or Beth seemed to mind the walk though. They had only spent one day in the car but after being on foot for so long being cooped up had felt like an eternity. Besides winter seemed to have finally let go of its last hold. The spring sun was shining down upon them, thawing out the last bits of winter's chill inside themselves, and the birds were chirping happily in the trees. Honestly Daryl wanted to be in the trees with them but they had better luck of finding a car if they were on the road and he didn't want to ask Beth to step into the tree cover again, not when she looked so happy to have the sun shining on her face.

Wait, the sun.

"The sun?" he grunted looking up at the aforementioned orb. The light of it hurt his eyes and he looked back down quickly blinking away dark spots from his vision.

"Yup." she cried happily, hooking her fingers into the straps of her pack and smiling over at him. "Your turn."

Daryl looked around the desolate road as they turned a corner. A piece of metal caught his eye and he was about to use that when a billboard came into view. The billboard had originally been for a cluster of restaurants that were coming up in a few miles but now words crisscrossed over it in a jumbled mess. He looked over at Beth and jerked his head over to it. She followed him wordlessly as they stared at the assorted handwritings coating the faded ads.

Uninterested Daryl made to turn back to the street but from the corner of his eye he saw Beth reach out and put her fingers softly against the words written there. Her fingers trailed down them and he saw her blink quickly like she was fighting back tears but when she turned to face him her eyes were dry.

"They're names." she whispered looking down at where her finger met the words. "I think they're people who have died."

He stepped closer to get a better look at the board. She was right, name after name was scrawled, some in paint, some in marker or pen, some in what he could only assume was blood. The names varied in size but he noticed as he peered more closely that none of the names overlapped. Some had an explanation next to it, he assumed for how they died. One name had bitten, one gun-shot, one had the word Terminus which he didn't understand. A strange numbness filled him at the sight of the names of so many dead. A small part of him wondered who wrote the names onto the board. Who had started this strange and sick process?

"This is beautiful." Beth whispered suddenly breaking him from his thoughts. He crinkled his brow at her, confused. He found the whole thing twisted, like counting off who was dead. Beth took his hand and pulled him next to her. "Its probably the only funeral most of them got." she explained leaning her head against his arm though her eyes were still glued to the board. Slowly he rubbed his thumb against her palm and considered this.

Sadly it was true. More than likely over three-quarters of the names on this board where either walkers, walker food or decomposing somewhere. Many of them likely got eaten or died in a place or time where no one could bury them. This was the only resting place or grave marker many of them would ever get.

"Its also an answer." Beth said softly. She seemed unable to raise her voice above a murmur. Surprisingly Daryl found he felt the same way. Even with the lack of bodies it still felt as though they were intruding in a graveyard.

"What do you mean?" he asked, his tone as soft as hers.

Beth looked up at him then, her blue eyes wide. "It tells you if you can stop looking for someone." she explained.

The thought had not crossed his mind. Daryl looked back to the names again his eyes scanning frantically before Beth squeezed his hand.

"None of them are there. I already checked." her gaze was fixed on the board again and Daryl let out his breath slowly, unsure if what he felt was relief or not. He had no names to look for but those from the prison. He didn't care about anyone he knew from before the turn enough to wonder about them now. Ever since Merle he had decided he was just better off not knowing.

But the lack of the people from the prison's names being on the board didn't mean that they were alive. It just meant no one had written on this one board that they weren't.

"Should we add names to this?" Beth asked suddenly, drawing him from his depressing thoughts. Daryl turned the idea over in his mind. Many of their dead they had managed to bury. But not all. Looking at Beth he realized that she might need this act of closure far more than she was letting on. Slowly he nodded.

Just as he was beginning to question where they would find a pen Beth removed her hand from his to bend down and rummage through a bucket he hadn't noticed. She stood, a fistful of pens in her hand and looked up at him. Her eyes narrowed slightly as she looked over his shoulder. She opened her mouth to say something but Daryl was already turning.

A pair of walkers had emerged from the trees to stumble towards the sound of their whispered conversation. Quickly Daryl fired off two bolts, both of which landed perfectly in the corpses head's. Slinging the crossbow back over his shoulder he went to retrieve his bolts frowning at the excess blood and chunks of brain that stuck to them. Satisfied that the road was now deserted he headed back to Beth who wordlessly handed him a marker.

"We should write them next to each other so we don't write the same name twice." Beth whispered as he stepped next to her and uncapped the pen. Nodding he pressed the marker to the board and paused. The faces of everyone he, they, had lost flashed past his eyes and he found himself unsure of where to start. The soft sound of the marker moving against the board drew his eyes to the words forming in Beth's small loopy handwriting.

_Herschel Greene._

Daryl placed a hand on the small of her back and she smiled sadly over at him. Taking a deep breath Daryl turned back to the board and began to scrawl the names of those they had lost. They wrote for several minutes filling the entire previously unused right bottom corner. Name after name filled the square: **Lori Grimes**_, Andrea Harrison, _**Shane Walsh.**It felt like they would never run out of names. Finally Beth stepped back from the board. Daryl stayed where he was his fingers clenching against the pen. He didn't want to write this last name. In fact it felt impossible for him to write it.

Merle was never much. He was loud and rude and nothing but trouble but he was also the only real family Daryl had ever had. He wasn't ready to say this last good-bye. He wasn't ready to have this marker.

A small hand slipped inside his free one then and he looked down at Beth whose eyes were filled with a sadness that must have been shining through his own. Daryl realized then that Merle wasn't the only family he had ever had, he was just the first. Slowly he scrawled the name of his dead brother among the names of the rest of his dead family.

Capping the pen Daryl stepped back and stared with Beth in silence at the names that seemed to take over the rest of the billboard to them.

"Should we write everyone else down too?" Beth asked quietly. Daryl didn't have to ask her who she meant. They did not talk about others making it out of the prison, not anymore. He didn't know if it was because they had given up on finding others or if they had given up on anyone else making it out alive. He still wasn't sure what he thought had happened to anybody else. It was hard for him to believe that only him and Beth made it out alive but it was harder for him to hope that they would ever see anyone else again. But even with that he was not ready to write everyone else off as dead. He did not think he could manage to write another name on that list. That board did not seem like it could hold much more sadness.

"Nah." he said with a shrug. "They might not be dead." It was the first time that he had said such a thing out loud. Beth was always the one to say the optimistic things. It was always her who could find the bright side of things or the hope in their situation. Hearing himself say it felt strange, foreign. But surprisingly not unpleasant.

Beth looked up at him with wide eyes, he was uneasy to see tears beginning to form in them. Crying women were never his strong suit. She laughed softly as if she could since his discomfort and ran her thumbs under her eyes.

"I just wish there was a way I could know what happened to them." she admitted. "Even if I never see another one of them again I just wish I could know if they were alive somewhere." she crossed her arms as if she was suddenly cold even though the sun still shone down on them.

Daryl looked at her once before training his eyes on the board. He knew how she felt, the not knowing was always the worst part. As he stared unseeingly at the names before him a thought occurred to him and he grabbed Beth's hand. She made a small noise of surprise as he dragged her around to the other side of the board. This side was blank, just the empty back of the board and the two metal beams keeping it upright. Not letting go of Beth's hand he stuck the pen cap in his mouth to pull it off.

Clenching his teeth around the cap he rose the pen to the board. Beth looked about to question him but as he began to write she fell into silence. Done, Daryl handed her the pen, she had to let go of his hand so that she could write. When she stepped back Daryl recapped the pen, balancing it on top of the pole.

As she stared at the words they had written he felt the need to explain himself. "I just thought if someone saw it." he shrugged unsure of how to word his intentions. "Its not much." he finally said.

"Yes it is." Beth looked over at him, her eyes shinny as the tears finally began to fall. They left tracks in the dust on her face. "Thank you." she whispered stepping forward to wrap her arms around him. He returned the embrace, happy to find that he no longer flinched when she fell into his arms. The embrace was awkward due to the bulkiness of their bags but he was still reluctant to let her go. Holding her made the pain of their losses just a little bit more bearable.

"Thanks for what?" he questioned with a grunt as they separated.

Her eyes shown as she looked at him, taking his hand in her own. "For hope."

Daryl could only manage a nod as they turned back to the road. As they stepped back onto the cracked and broken asphalt he spared one look over his shoulder. Five words stood alone on the otherwise empty board.

**Alive: **

**Daryl Dixon**

_Beth Greene_


	7. Chapter 7

Author's Note: Thanks everyone for reading and reviewing! I am glad you are enjoying reading it as much as I enjoy writing it. Quick note as there seemed to be some confusion about the story's time line with regard to the show. This is only canon up to the events of "Still"because I originally wrote it as a one-shot at that time. The events from "Alone" did not happen to Beth/Daryl.

Also if you have a tumblr I use the tag _#the difference between living and surviving _to post about updates or other things about the story. If you have ideas/thoughts/prompts/anything you'd like throw at me you can also post it there at I will see it. Thanks!

Enjoy!

Chapter Seven

"I don't think its broken." Beth hissed in pain as Daryl ran his fingers up over her leg. His cold fingers passed over the holes in her jeans and pressed lightly on the sides of her knee cap. A small cry passed her lips at the sudden blare of agony.

Daryl glanced up at her and shook his head. "It's dislocated." he looked back down at her knee and frowned, his brow crinkling."I can feel the bone moved out of place." he explained as he adjusted his crossbow and bag on his shoulders She reached down to touch her knee softly and filched at the feeling of the knee cap out of alignment. Daryl bent to help Beth raise which she did shakily putting weight on only her left leg. Her right leg was stiff and unable to bend or rise very high off the ground.

"What do we do now?" Beth asked quietly, fighting back tears at the pain blaring up her leg and the feeling of uselessness she now felt.

"We need to get to shelter." Daryl wrapped an arm tightly around her waist and began to lead her back onto the road. Beth tried not to groan at the slow and uncomfortable walking process, they weren't going to get anywhere very fast with her only able to walk on one leg. Silently she cursed her stupidity. They had been in the woods hunting for food as their supply was running low when she got her foot tangled in a tree root. She had toppled over and twisted at the last second to catch herself. When she twisted her ankle remained caught in the branches and she had hit the dirt floor as something in her leg popped. She had been hoping that it was only a twist or a sprain but she knew before Daryl told her that it was more than that. The pain and the sound of it had not been lost on her.

They emerged from the trees to hobble down the abandoned road, Beth's right leg dragging uselessly on the floor. Their slow gait left both of them feeling uneasy and they fell into silence both darting their eyes around nonstop, any more than a few walkers would likely be impossible to fight off with her in this condition. Silently they made their difficult trek for nearly an hour, Beth trying not to pass out from the increasing torment in her leg. They had barely gone two miles since they started and already she was exhausted. Daryl pointed to a sign they were coming up to promising lodging at the next exit.

"We'll try there." he whispered and she nodded weakly. Silently she kept cursing at herself for tripping. Even though they weren't necessarily in a hurry to get to the Capitol they had already not been making good time. It had been a week since they had started on their journey and even though they had managed to drive for a good while they were still only just out of South Carolina, they had passed the entry sign into North Carolina early that morning. Their progress was slow, not just because of her new injury, but because of the constant threat of walkers. They were only able to walk in the daylight because they couldn't risk flashlights or walking through the night. Neither was comfortable risking themselves so unnecessarily to the low visibility. They also spent their mornings trying to hunt down game which was the cause of her leg injury and their newest delay.

Part of her was beginning to think that this whole trek was stupid but she was unwilling to call it off. Daryl seemed to need a quest as much as she needed to have a destination. She had no idea what they would even do once they got to DC but it made it easier for her to sleep knowing that they had a place to go and all of their wanderings weren't just in an aimless pursuit for shelter.

Twenty some minutes later they slowly approached a small motel. There was ten rooms in a u-shaped building, the doors all on the outside under a broken awning. In the middle of the parking lot there were two cars that had clearly crashed into each other. Broken glass littered the asphalt and pinned in between the cars a walker lay stretched out on one of the hoods. It looked up and reached for them as they passed, letting out a low groan. Near one of the doors were the bodies of two more walkers with their heads crushed in. A large dried blood stain spread from their bodies. Cautiously they approached the first motel door. Daryl helped Beth lean against the wall before he knocked faintly on the door of the motel. After a few seconds of silence they heard something hit the door from the inside and the growls of a walker. Beth watched as Daryl repeated this process on the next three doors before he finally tried to open a door. He held up a hand to indicate Beth should stay where she was.

She huffed under her breath resting her hand on the hilt of her knife. As if she could have followed him if she wanted to. A few moments later Daryl came out of the room and headed back to her. She made to wrap her arm around his waist not looking forward to hobbling even the mere twenty feet to the door but before she could he scooped her up into his arms. She gasped in surprise and bit back a smile as he carried her bridal still over the threshold of the door, kicking it shut behind them.

The room was dusty and smelled of mildew but it was clean and clear of corpses. Beth giggled as Daryl deposited her lightly on one of the beds, the pain in her leg momentarily forgotten.

"Wow I even get my own bed tonight?" she joked as she scooted back on it. After spending the last week sleeping on the floor of the woods she didn't think a mattress had ever felt so fine.

Daryl peered down at her and she grinned reaching up to place a hand on his chest. "I'm kidding." she whispered pulling him down to press her lips to his. He kissed her back briefly before pulling away to which she made a weak noise of protest.

"We need to take care of that knee." he said standing and going to the other bed where his bag lay and rummaging through it. Beth groaned and removed her own bag from her back before flopping against the mattress and staring up at the yellowing ceiling.

"Thanks for reminding me." she groaned as the pain suddenly pushed itself back to the forefront of her mind. Daryl made a noise she thought might have been a chuckle before he came back and popped the button on her jeans. Beth's eyes opened and she rose an eyebrow at him.

Daryl rolled his eyes. "I need to see your knee better." Slowly he began to slid her jeans off, she arched herself off the bed to help him push them past her hips. As he began to pull them off her hurt leg she winced at the sensation. Finally he succeeded in easing the material off her swollen knee cap and tossed the jeans on the floor behind him.

Beth propped herself up on her elbows and looked down at her knee. Already it was swollen and she could see that her kneecap was slightly out of place as well. Taking a deep breath Beth shut her eyes and lay back again. Looking at it was almost worse than the pain. She tried not to wince as Daryl ran his fingers over it softly, even his light touch felt like knives.

"I've never broken a bone." she said through clenched teeth hoping to distract herself from the injury.

"Point for you." Daryl said absentmindedly. His fingers hit a tender spot and she was not able to bite back the cry of pain. She could feel him looking at her and tried to sit up to show him that she was okay. "We're going to have to push the cap back in place." he explained and she felt herself pale. That sounded astonishingly painful.

Slowly she nodded, biting her lip. "Do you know how?" she inquired quietly.

Daryl didn't say anything just adjusted his hold on her leg. Placing one hand on her thigh and the other on her ankle he slowly pushed her leg back so her leg was slightly bent. Carefully he pulled on her ankle and she felt the cap begin to shift. Beth cried out and arched her back at the pain that nearly blinded her before she felt the cap shift back into place and her muscles untensed. The pain was still there but it was more subdued. She ran her hands over her face as she felt Daryl begin to wrap her knee tightly with a roll of cloth bandages they had taken from their last house.

"Where'd you learn to do that?" she asked gently propping herself back up on her elbows to look down at him. He didn't look up from her leg as he shrugged. Beth bit her lip at the sudden closed look on Daryl's face. She had forgotten how little he liked to discuss his past. She opened her mouth to say he didn't have to tell her when he suddenly spoke.

"Popped my shoulder out of place a few times as a kid." he shrugged as he finished wrapping her knee. "Figured couldn't be all that different to fix."

He seemed so uncomfortable Beth decided not to press the issue although she was dying to know how he had dislocated his shoulder enough as a child to have to learn how to fix it himself.

"Thank you." she whispered as he rose off his knees to sit next to her on the bed. She sat up and leaned her head against his shoulder, lightly running her fingers over her bandaged knee. She winced but the pain was not as intense as it was before.

Daryl rummaged in the back pack next to them before pulling out a small orange bottle and handing it to her. "Painkillers." he handed her a bottle of water as well but Beth shook her head.

"No really. The pain isn't so bad now." she looked at him and smiled softly. "I don't want to waste them."

"Its not a waste. You're in pain." He opened the bottle and spilled one of the little white pills into her hand. Knowing she wouldn't win this fight Beth popped it into her mouth and swallowed.

Wiping the back of her hand across her mouth she frowned down at her leg. "How long until I can walk on it?"

She felt Daryl shrug as he wrapped his arm around her waist. "A few weeks most like. It wasn't to badly out of place so it might heal faster."

Beth groaned and buried her head against his chest. "I'm sorry." she whispered her voice nearly lost in his leather jacket.

"Why?" he asked, his voice confused as he began running his fingers through her hair.

"For delaying us. For being hurt." Beth sighed. She hated feeling so helpless and weak.

"Got nothing to be sorry for." Daryl placed a finger under her chin and tilted her face up to look at her. "People get hurt. It happens." His blue eyes were steady on hers in a gaze that made her blush and look down.

"So you're not just going to sneak out the second I fall asleep?" she meant it as a joke but the second it came out she realized she was actually afraid of it. While she didn't think that was something Daryl would do to her, or anyone, she couldn't shake the fear that she was now to useless to stay with. Daryl didn't say anything and she looked up at him in a sudden burst of fear.

An emotion she couldn't quiet place passed over Daryl's face then and he pulled her to him and kissed her roughly. She gasped in surprise at the sudden passion of it and before she could really return the kiss Daryl pulled away. He only went far enough so he could rest his forehead against hers.

"I love you Beth Greene." he whispered, making her heart beat faster at the sound. "I ain't never gonna leave you."


	8. Chapter 8

Chapter Eight

The sunlight streaming through the gap in the curtains hit Daryl's closed eyelids and slowly pulled him from slumber. Groaning lightly he opened his eyes to squint a glare at the aforementioned light silently cursing the fact that he hadn't closed the curtains all the way the night before. Sleeping on the bed was still such a luxury that he was not willing to leave it and the glare of the sun only annoyed him at its desire to shine directly into his eyes.

Sighing, he made to roll over onto his side but found he was unable to due to the fact that Beth was cuddled on his chest, using it as a pillow even though there was plenty of pillows already on the bed. Daryl placed his hand on her head and lightly ran his fingers through her loose blonde hair.

Her knee was healing nicely and she could almost walk the length of the room alone without having to stop due to the pain. Daryl felt overwhelming relief at this because popping her knee back into place had only been guess work. When he had done it he wasn't sure if he was actually going to be helping her or hurting her. He was lucky it was a similar technique to the way Merle would pop his shoulder back into place after their dad pushed him down the stairs or after the wild fist fight they had once gotten into.

Daryl knew that Beth felt extremely guilty for her injury and for its consequential delay to the Capitol but he didn't mind. It had led to the past three weeks of being somewhere relatively safe with her and sharing a bed with her. It was always a relief to not have to sleep with his bag packed and at his side. He liked when both of them got to sleep at the same time as well, instead of taking turns staying up half the night to keep watch.

They had cleared out the rest of the motel and taken the few meager supplies they could find. Well, Daryl cleared the walkers but Beth insisted on hobbling after him with the walking stick he had made for her to help him clean out the rooms. They hadn't been able to find much. Only two of the rooms had not had dead people in them so they had taken all the linens from those ones. The rest of the rooms the smell of rotting flesh had sunk into everything so they had only managed to get some soap, matches and a few things of food.

Burning the dead had taken them an entire day. Beth had hobbled around looking for things they could use to start the fire as Daryl pulled the corpses around to the back of the motel. They had to wait until the next day to start the fire so that the flames shining through the night wouldn't lead anyone, living or dead, to their current sanctuary.

They finally saw another sign of fellow survivors when a car sped down the street about a week after they got to the hotel. By the time they heard the engine they were unable to catch much more but the back end of a white van as it turned the corner. But just the knowledge that somewhere someone else was still alive in this mess had felt like a weight being lifted off of them. They never mentioned it but Daryl knew Beth had also felt like they were the only two people left living in this world. Sometimes that was almost a good feeling, such as when she curled into his side as they lay down to sleep at night. But most of the time it just left them feeling hopeless.

Beth made a small noise in her sleep and rolled over onto her back. Free to move Daryl sat up slowly in order not wake her knowing she was an extremely light sleeper, a necessary survival skill in this world. Walking past the empty second bed in the room Daryl went to the window and peered out the gap in the curtains at the parking lot. There was no change in it from the previous day, baring the two crashed cars in the center it was empty. Happy that there were no walkers roaming around this morning Daryl shut the curtains tight against the morning light and headed back to the bed hoping to catch a few more moments of sleep.

Running a hand through his outgrown hair he climbed into the bed and turned onto his side. He was just closing his eyes when he felt soft fingers touch his back.

"Morning." he heard Beth mumble as she pressed herself close against him, spooning into his back. One of her arms snaked over his waist and he slipped his hand into hers.

"I wake you?" he asked, he felt a bit guilty of robing her of even seconds of precious sleep when they were in a safe place to get it. He felt her shake her head no against her back.

"Sun." she grumbled causing him to chuckle. Beth was actually a morning person but it took her a few minutes to fully come out of slumber. She placed her head between his shoulder blades and he froze when she kissed his back, more specifically when she pressed her lips against one of his scars.

Daryl knew she had seen the scars, had felt them even when her hands grasped his shoulders when they made love. He had never explained them and she had never asked. It was one of their few unspoken taboos. He didn't mention her family unless she brought it up first and she didn't mention his past unless he gave information freely. It was one of the many reasons why he loved Beth, she didn't push him and she never asked him for anything he wasn't already willing to give.

He felt her sigh against his back as she lay her forehead between his shoulder blades. Daryl ran his fingers lightly over her arm.

"My father gave them to me." he whispered. He felt Beth's eyelashes flutter against his skin as she opened her eyes. He could feel the pain of the memory on his face and found himself glad that he wasn't facing her. Daryl stared through the darkness of the room and tried to forget the sting of his father's belt against his skin. "He only did it to Merle but once he got shipped to juvie." He shrugged and swallowed down the sting of saying his brother's name. "Said it was for our own good."

They lay in silence for a moment as Daryl continued to stare out into nothing. Part of him wondered if this would change what Beth thought of him but the majority of him felt relief that now the facts were out there. He had never before said where he got those scars out loud. Just putting it out into the world felt almost freeing.

Beth pulled her hand from his and he felt his heart seize with panic. He knew he shouldn't have told her, she would only see him differently now. He clenched his jaw in anger at himself for telling her something so personal when he felt her fingers on his back again.

Slowly Beth traced the marks on his back where his father's belt had hit him the hardest and he felt his muscles unclench. Years of tension seemed to flow out of him as she ran her fingers over the reminders of his family that he would take to the grave no matter how hard he tried to forget them. She didn't say anything as she touched him which was a relief. Daryl didn't want to hear apologies about something she had no part in. He didn't want her pity or her questions so it was a welcome comfort that she gave him neither. He rolled over onto his back and she looked down at him.

Beth cupped his face in her palm and bent to kiss him, her long blonde hair falling ticklishly onto his chest. Her lips were soft against his and she pulled back quicker than he wanted.

"I love you." she whispered her blue eyes poring into his. He reached up to tuck a strand of her hair behind her ear happy that her gaze on him had not changed in the slightest. It had not adjusted to add in pity or disgust. She looked at him with the same bright blue eyes that she had always looked at him with.

"I love you too." Daryl whispered back before pulling her down to him and crashing her lips onto his.


	9. Chapter 9

Chapter Nine

"You sure your ready for this?" Beth smiled down at her feet as she finished tugging on her boots. That had to be the fifth time that morning alone that Daryl had asked her that question. She looked over at him where he sat across from her on the edge of the other bed.

"I'm sure." she reassured him with a smile slipping off the bed to kneel in front of him on the dirty blue carpet resting her hands on his thighs. "My knee is fine. Its healed completely normal thanks to you." Even with her calm tone and words Daryl still looked unsure and the crease between his eyebrows did not lessen. Beth gripped his large hands in her small ones. "We can't keep hiding out here because of me." she whispered her eyes imploring him to understand.

Daryl shook his head and mumbled. "We're not hiding. You needed to heal."

Beth smiled. "And I have. But we should keep going. At this rate we'll never get to DC."

He let out his breath in a slight huff. "Didn't realize you were in such a hurry." despite the joking tone of his voice Beth could still hear the genuine worry it held.

"We're gonna be just fine." she promised as she leaned up to kiss him. "Have a little faith."

Daryl merely nodded at her as she stood and sat back down on the bed. He pulled his jacket onto his arms before he began to search the room for any supplies they might have missed. Beth smiled softly at his back before she began to pull her long hair up into a tight ponytail. Once it was up she sectioned off a small part and began to tightly braid it. She was just tying it off when Daryl sat down across from her again.

"You ready?" she asked dropping her hands into her lap.

He nodded slowly. "What's with the braid?" he finally asked, his voice curious and taking her by surprise. One of their many unspoken agreements was to never ask or mention their pasts until the other person brought it up first. She found she didn't mind though, it wasn't exactly a secret and after Daryl had shared the story about his scars with her she didn't feel the need for either of them to hold anything back between them.

Beth ran her tongue over her lips as she thought of how best to explain. "The day that all of this started happening my mom and I were watching tv. I don't remember what was on, some stupid movie probably. Mom was playing with my hair." Beth smiled at the memory. "She never could keep her hands still." That was an understatement that Beth could not think of a way to fully explain to Daryl. Her mother was constantly moving her fingers because she was so accustomed to moving them across piano keys making hauntingly beautiful melodies that filled the farm house. She was always drumming her fingers on the steering wheel or running her fingers over Hershel's arm, playing with Beth's hair. It was as though her fingers were unable to keep still. Even after she had been bitten and the fever started to slowly drive her to delusions and than death, her fingers were the last thing to stop moving. And the first thing to move when she came back. Beth shook her head against the memory of her parent's bedroom and the sight of her mother's chest no longer moving with breath.

"She had just finished putting the braid in my hair when the news announcement came on." Beth explained with a shrug, her throat feeling tight with unshed tears. "Its stupid really. It just reminds me of her is all. Reminds me of when things were still simple." she ended on a whisper before shaking her head again fighting back the sharp bite of tears in her eyes. "Its stupid." she repeated clutching her hands in her lap.

There was silence for a moment before Daryl reached over and took her hands into his. "Its not stupid." she looked up at him with a small smile as a tear finally spilled over onto her cheek. She pulled her hand away to hastily brush it away but Daryl got there first, softly brushing it off her face with his thumb.

"Its not stupid." he repeated. Beth took a deep breath before nodding at him. She reached behind her to grab her bag and pull it onto her shoulders.

"Ready?" she asked raising to her feet. Silently Daryl rose and followed her to the door. She paused at the doorway, her hand clutching tightly at the doorknob. "I've never stayed in a motel before this." she said turning to grin at Daryl over her shoulder in an attempt to lighten the solemn mood that had fallen between them.

He shook his head at her. "You lose." she frowned at him in mock sadness as he adjusted the strap of his crossbow. "I've never." he paused briefly before glancing down at her, the hint of a smirk on his lips. "Had sex in a motel before this." a light blush formed on her cheeks as he gazed at her.

"You lose." she said clearing her throat and removing her hand from the door to brush a loose hair back behind her ear.

Daryl shrugged before reaching behind her to open the door. His face was close to hers as he whispered. "Still winning."

Four hours of walking later the pair slowly approached a deserted gas station. The parking lot and parts of the street around it were cluttered with an assortment of abandoned cars in varying stages of disuse. They split up to look at each car separately the light breeze making the wooden sign hanging from the pumps clatter against the metal every so often, _**Out of gas.**_

The first two cars that Beth approached had flat tires and the third's hood was crushed against another car. All of them were sporting faded paint and flecks of rust from the months, if not years, out in the elements. Hopefully, Beth approached a fourth car whose rear window was smashed in. She crept around it to the front and sighed as she saw that the steering wheel was broken off and hanging from an odd angle. Sighing, she walked over to the car where Daryl sat in the driver's seat his hands tangled in wires under the wheel. He fumbled for a few minutes his frown growing deeper as each second passed before finally leaning back in the seat.

"Engine's dead." he grumbled squinting up at her. "Looks like we keep walking."

Beth shrugged. "Good thing my knee healed." she said with a smile as Daryl nodded and clambered out of the car.

"We should see if they got anything good." he said pointing at the gas station. The door hung crooked on its hinges and two of its four windows were broken.

"You think there's anything left in there?" Beth asked in surprise as she followed him across the parking lot.

"Won't know unless we check." he shrugged as he stopped at the doorway. He rapped his fist against the door once and they both stood back to wait. Beth had counted to eighty by the time Daryl deemed it was safe enough for them to go inside. He held the broken door aside for her and she walked into the dark interior, blinking as her eyes adjusted to the sudden change in light.

The inside was in even worse disarray than the outside. The glass refrigerators on the sides were smashed in, broken bottles spilling out of them onto the floor in a collection of broken multicolored glass. An assortment of dried leaves, assorted food wrappers, and two year old magazines littered the floor. Beth stepped around a stack of rumpled newspapers and headed to look at the counter as Daryl wandered over to the other side of the store. She was surprised to find that the cash register was open and empty but she assumed that it was likely looted before people realized what they really ought to be stealing. She ran her fingers across the dust on the counter top before stepping around it in the hopes she could find something of use in all the mess.

She had just stepped behind it when she felt something grab her calf. She let out a yelp of surprise as she was knocked off her feet. She landed with a groan on her back and reached for her knife as she heard Daryl yell her name from across the store. Before she could respond her arms were being pinned down and something was crawling on top of her. Her heart froze in terror unwilling to believe she had survived so long only to have her throat ripped out on the floor of a gas station. The creature bent to her face and ran its nose over her neck. Her pulse began to race waiting for the pain when the thing on top of her suddenly whispered.

"Smells so sweet, not like me." it cooed with a giggle. Her eyes widened and she began to struggle again as she realized that the man on top of her was actually alive and what he intended to do with her might be worse than having her throat ripped open.

He leaned away from suddenly and she gazed with terror at him. A wild tangled black beard covered most of his face and he grinned down at her with yellowing teeth. His brown eyes held a wild frantic look as she fought to buck him off of her. He began to grin when Daryl vaulted over the counter and shoved his knife through the man's temple. Beth watched with wide eyes as the wild look faded from his eyes and a small bubble of blood burst on his lips.

Daryl heaved the body off of her and reached down for her. She brushed his hand away and turned over onto all fours before heaving up the meager contents of her stomach.

"Did it bite you?" Daryl's voice was thick with fear as he reached over and touched her neck. She flinched away from his touch and sat back on her haunches, wiping her mouth with her sleeve.

"Beth?" Daryl questioned, bending down to her level. "Are you bit?" he repeated trying to mask the terror in his voice but failing miserably.

She shook her head before dropping her head into her hands. "He was alive." she whispered looking at her lap. Daryl made a small noise and she looked up at him. "He was _alive."_ she repeated her voice thick with emotion.

Daryl looked at her in confusion before his face seemed to close off. "Don't." he whispered his voice tight. "Don't you shed one fucking tear for that scum. Do you have any idea what he was about to do to you?" his voice was slowly getting louder but Beth shook her head frantically against his words.

"I'm not upset that he's dead!" she cried, interrupting Daryl's rant and causing him to stare blankly at her. She fought for the words to explain what she was feeling.

It was true she wasn't upset that he was dead, in fact she was _glad_ that he was. Whose to say he hadn't already done what he'd been trying to do to Beth to other people? Now he couldn't hurt anybody else. She wasn't upset because she had to watch him die either. Beth had seen plenty of death in the last few years. She had watched her own father get beheaded in front of her not even a year past. Nor was Beth upset that Daryl had killed someone, she knew he had done that before and she herself had shot to kill on the day that the prison was overrun.

As Daryl's piercing blue eyes stared at her she struggled to put what was upsetting her into words. "He was alive." she choked out again. Daryl looked like he was about to rise in fury and walk away from her before she managed to choke out what was upsetting her so much. "And my father's not."

Daryl's brow furrowed as he settled back onto the floor and looked at her. She shook her head, tears blurring her vision. "Lori's not. Patricia's not. T-Dog." he voice cracked on the names and she choked back a sob. "They were good people." she explained looking up at Daryl through her tears. He gazed at her sadly, his anger having clearly left him as he began to understand why she was crying and huddled on the floor of the gas station.

"They were good people and they're dead while people like him get to keep living!" Beth cried out flinging her arm in the direction of the corpse laying only feet from them. A sob fled from her lips as she collapsed onto her lap. "Maggie might be dead but people like him are still walking around." she sobbed into her lap, the words muffled against her jeans. "Is there anybody good left?" She felt Daryl's hand on her back and try as she might she could not get the tears to stop falling. Daryl's hand grasped her arm and pulled her into a sitting position. She took a deep breath to try to get the tears to stop, embarrassed for falling apart so completely.

Beth tried to pull herself out of Daryl's arms. "I'll be okay. I'll be okay." she whispered trying to tug her hands free to brush away the tears or hide her face. Daryl's arms only wrapped tighter around her as he pulled her onto his lap.. Beth bit her lip and tucked her head into Daryl's shoulder as she tried to gain control of the sobs.

"There are still good people left." Daryl whispered into her ear as he reached up to stroke her hair. Beth closed her eyes against the sight of the corpse and turned to bury her face in Daryl's chest. "Maggie is still out there somewhere." he continued breaking the last part of control Beth had on her tears. That was the first time he had said such a thing as a definite and not as a maybe. "Have faith."


	10. Chapter 10

Chapter Ten

Daryl clutched at the long tangled strands of Beth's hair, pulling them back from her face as she vomited onto the side of the road. Her stomach had long since been empty of food but as they stood in the chill air of the afternoon light she continued to throw up yellow film that reeked of stomach acid. Finally she coughed dryly a few times before taking a deep breath and pushing herself into a standing position. She wiped her hand across her mouth before spitting to the side.

"Better?" Daryl asked as he let go of her hair. Beth nodded, an embarrassed look on her face.

"Sorry." she whispered in a small voice to which Daryl shook his head. It wasn't as though he'd never seen someone throwing up before. The amount of times he'd seen Merle empty his stomach after drinking to much as a teen was astounding.

"Some kills are just messy." he said with a shrug looking over his shoulder at the walker whose head he had crushed against the floor with his boot upon which point Beth had begun to throw up more than she actually had eaten in days.

She ran her hands over her now pale face and shook her head again. "And to think I used to have such a strong stomach." Daryl passed her a water bottle which she took gratefully. Taking a small sip she rinsed her mouth out and spit to the side again. "Ugh." she groaned. "What I wouldn't give for a stick of gum."

"Wanna take a detour then?" Daryl asked as she passed him back the water bottle and they started down the highway again.

"What do you have in mind?" Beth looked at him with a small smile as the color began to slowly return to her face.

"Saw a sign a few miles back for a town coming up around here." Daryl explained as he hitched his bag higher up on his shoulders. "We need to set up camp for the night anyways." he said looking over sideways at Beth. He didn't say it but he was thinking they needed to get her some medicine too. Ever since the gas station two days ago she had gotten sick four times. Daryl was beginning to think she might have caught a bug from the man who had attacked her. He didn't say anything to her about it because he didn't want to worry her. He also didn't want to worry himself anymore than he already was. He hoped it was just a small stomach flu and not some strain of the flu that had taken over the prison. Daryl was no doctor, sure he could fix up cuts and bruises but he'd had plenty of experience with those types of injuries. Diseases were a whole other matter that was not his expertise. He had decided that morning when he had woken up to Beth throwing up at the edge of their camp that they needed to get some medicine in her. Unfortunately they had been on a lone stretch of highway all day and the closest town was still miles away.

"Think you can make it?" Daryl asked her as they passed a sign nearly half an hour later promising the town's exit would be in five miles.

Beth smiled at him and nodded. Admittedly she didn't look too sick which one of the only things appeasing Daryl's frantically worrying mind. When the people at the prison had been sick you could tell they were ill. They were pale and sweaty and she looked to be perfectly normal. Beth hadn't started having the cough that had racked the prison yet either.

"Where do you want to stay tonight?" she asked a few minutes later as they made their way. Daryl looked back at her, he had been distracted by the dark clouds that had begun to roll in from the east. He paused to think it over, his brow crinkling in thought. He needed to get her medicine but how to explain his desire to sleep in a pharmacy in a way that wasn't odd? She'd be better off sleeping in a bed anyway than on a cold store floor.

"We'll find a house." he decided. Then she could sleep on a bed and if there was no medicine to be found there he would simply sneak out and find a pharmacy on his own. No need for her to be put in more danger when she was sick anyway.

"Daryl?" he snapped out of his darkening thoughts at her inquiring tone. "What's wrong?" her large blue eyes stared at him, worry filling them to the brim.

He was saved from answering as a walker had begun to shuffle onto the road in front of them. A quick shot from his cross bow later the body crumpled to the ground. As they approached it silently Daryl bent and retrieved his arrow mentally reminding himself that he needed to make more that night. He was down to only five bolts now and he did not relish the idea of coming up empty handed one day.

"That's the eighth one today." Beth whispered as they continued on. Daryl nodded as he shoved the bolt back into his quiver. They were beginning to see more walkers as they neared larger cities. Part of him wondered exactly what they would be walking into when they got to DC but a larger part of him didn't really care. That was something they could deal with later. He had much more important things to worry about right now.

They made the rest of their trek into the town in silence, both all to aware that any extra noise would only draw more walkers to them. Daryl led them down the first exit they came to and cursed to himself when he realized that he had taken them into the downtown area instead of a residential center. They ducked down a side street and cautiously made their way down a back alley, Beth quickly putting down the one walker that was aimlessly wandering down it.

"We should go inside somewhere." she whispered next to Daryl's ear. He nodded, there were way to many walkers on the streets for them to keep wandering around, especially with darkness fast approaching. Daryl refused to let this trip be in vain so he peered around the corner of the alley and scanned the names of the storefronts. Gratefully he spied a sign for a pharmacy at the end of the block. Roughly ten or so walkers filled the street between them and the store.

"We going to the pharmacy." Daryl whispered back. Beth opened her mouth as if she was going to ask him why they would risk crossing the street when they could choose somewhere much closer but she simply nodded at him after a moment of silence. The amount of trust she put in him always surprised him.

They crept to the end of the alley and Beth looked up at him again, mouthing the word "Plan?" at him. Daryl shrugged back at her and mouthed, "Run."

That was all the motivation she needed. Beth ran out of the alley, her knife unsheathed and held tight in her hand as Daryl followed her out, his crossbow held at the ready. The walkers on the street turned towards them but neither of them slowed until they reached the pharmacy storefront. Beth made to go for the door but Daryl grabbed her arm and pulled her around the side of the shop instead. Leaving Beth to keep guard he managed to jimmy open the locked back door to the building in another trick he was suddenly grateful his brother had taught him. He grabbed Beth by the arm and pulled her in after him, slamming the door shut behind them.

Beth gasped as they were plunged into darkness and Daryl cursed lightly. Digging in his pockets he came up with a book of matches and he lit one carefully. Holding it high over his head he locked the door they had come through again and led Beth through the small storeroom of supplies to the door into the main part of the store. Satisfied that the room they were in was empty Daryl slowly opened the door into the front half and knocked his bow against the door frame lightly. They waited with their breath held but nothing stirred inside.

Slowly the pair moved out into the store, Beth still clutching her knife. Daryl was pleased to see that the walkers on the street had forgotten them already and had simply returned to their aimless wandering. He was grateful his plan of not going through the front doors had worked. Since the walkers hadn't seen where they had gone they had given up on finding them.

Beth let out a sudden gasp and he turned towards the shelves she stood by quickly. "You alright?" he whispered. Her back was towards him but he thought she shoved something in her pocket before turning towards him with a shaky smile.

"Yea, sorry." she started looking at the shelves again, running her fingers over the thick layer of dust on them. "You see any mints?" she asked hopefully.

Daryl shook his head and joined her in her browsing, only he searched instead for flu medicine. A few minutes later he heard Beth give a small satisfied cry and she turned towards him with a pack of gum in her hands.

He shook his head at her bright smile as she walked back over to him unwrapping the cellophane as she did so.

"I've never stolen from a store before." she admitted as she popped a stick of gum in her mouth before turning the pack towards Daryl.

"Point." he admitted with a shrug as he removed a stick of gum from the pack. He had stolen plenty of candy from stores as a child. As he grew older Merle continued to steal, taking alcohol and cigarettes whenever he could. Daryl had reaped the rewards with him but he had never taken part in the acquisition of the goods.

Beth's gaze on him didn't change at all as she waited for his reply. Daryl was still surprised when she didn't judge his answers, no matter what they were. He always felt as though his past would convince her to leave him or to treat him differently but she always accepted his past as just that, the past. He wished he could the same.

"I've never swallowed gum." he came up with as the mint flavor sprang over his tongue. Beth grinned at him.

"Really?" she asked in surprised. "Not even as a kid?"

Daryl shrugged and shook his head no at her.

"Well point." Beth admitted as she pocketed the pack. "I used to think gum was candy so I always swallowed it. Then Shawn told me that a doctor was going to have to cut the gum out of me and I didn't chew gum again until I was fourteen." she shook her head with a laugh at the memory. "Course Shawn also convinced me that if I ate watermelon seeds one would grow in my stomach."

Daryl snorted. "You believe him?" Beth grinned sheepishly at him and Daryl chuckled. "How old were you?"

A light blush spread across Beth's face. "Twelve." she admitted causing Daryl to actually laugh out loud. She grinned back at him but their merriment was suddenly cut off as a loud crack of thunder filled the air. Both turned to look out the shop window where large raindrops were beginning to splatter on the pavement outside.

Sighing, Daryl handed Beth the bottle of anti-nausea pills he had found. She took it with a raised eyebrow but opened it without question. "Looks like we're staying here tonight." Daryl said as he turned to the back of the store again. "Let's see if they've got an employee room back here." Beth dry swallowed the pill before following him back into the dark room, another clap of thunder sounding behind them.


	11. Chapter 11

Chapter Eleven

Sucking in her breath Beth slowly lifted Daryl's arm from where it lay heavy across her stomach. As slowly as possible she eased off of the worn blue couch and onto the carpeted floor, softly placing Daryl's arm back onto the couch that filled over half of the space in the pharmacy's tiny employee break room. Soundlessly rising to her feet she carefully stepped around the table that took up the remaining space of the room and slipped out of the door and into the blackness of the chilly storeroom.

Claps of thunder could still be heard from outside as well as the patter of rain on the ceiling but the storm seemed to be reaching its last legs. Thunderstorms used to be Beth's favorite type of weather and a small part of her wished that she could be outside watching the lightening streak across the turbulent sky. The feeling of rain running down her skin would be a welcome relief as well. One never got truly clean using soap and bottled water, or the baby wipes that they had found in the pharmacy earlier that afternoon. The thought of being completely clean seemed like such an impossible task now that Beth could honestly not believe that she ever used to complain when her family had used up all of the hot water. Even a cold shower would be heavenly these days.

Having memorized the layout of where she needed to go earlier that night Beth placed her hand on the wall to her left and tiptoed the four feet to the only other door on that wall. As she eased it shut behind her she let out a sigh of relief that Daryl had not woken up. She would have felt pleased with herself for not waking up the lightest sleeper she had ever met were she not so nauseously worried. Flicking on her small flashlight she bent to wiggle the small cardboard box out of the cupboard under the sink where she had wedged it earlier. The moment that Daryl had put his arm around her when they lay down to sleep she had been grateful for the foresight to remove the box from her waistband where she had shoved it upon finding it.

The moment she had seen the small blue box on the cluttered pharmacy shelves she felt her whole being freeze in both terror and understanding. At this point she felt like the contents of the box were merely a formality. The second she had laid eyes on it she had started to count off all the signs she knew of and she could honestly not believe that it had taken her so long to realize what should have been obvious weeks ago.

Holding the flashlight between her teeth she read the instructions on the back silently before opening the cardboard flap with shaking fingers. The small white stick looked so harmless in her hands that Beth was almost fooled into thinking that this wasn't going to be as bad as she anticipated, that maybe she really did just have a flu or a stomach virus like Daryl thought.

Not wanting to take the risk she did as the instructions told her and peed on the stick, a whole level of awkwardness she had never felt before even though she was alone in the dark and dank smelling bathroom. Despite the dirty and disrepair of the bathroom Beth wished she could always have one on hand. However, it was surprisingly easy how quick one got used to urinating in the woods.

As she stood and re-buttoned her jeans she sat the test carefully on the edge of the sink and flipped off the flashlight. There was no need to drain the batteries and, honestly, she'd rather not look at that stick again until she absolutely had to. Her mind was frantic enough already without the aid of a visual.

Leaning back against the cold bathroom wall part of her desperately wanted Daryl to be there with her for this agonizing wait but a larger part of her thought that this was going to be bad enough without him worrying along with her. Beth herself had mixed enough feelings on this. She did not know what she wanted the test to say, she knew what she thought that the test would say, but she did not know how she actually felt. Her mind and emotions had been in such an insane whirlwind since she had found the test that she couldn't pinpoint a single one.

Beth found her thoughts inexplicably being drawn to Judith and she sunk down the wall to crouch on her hunches, burying her head in her hands. Thinking of Judith was almost as bad as thinking about Maggie, actually Beth toughs that it might even be worse. She knew her sister was tough, she was certainly tougher than Beth could ever dream of being. Maggie made it out of the prison, that was something she was slowly beginning to think of as a fact. Thinking that of course didn't make it any easier for her because it often led to her thinking that something bad had happened to her sister after she got out of the prison. It was the only reason she could think of for them not finding her, for not finding anyone. They had all run into some danger that Beth and Daryl had somehow managed to avoid.

But Beth knew in her heart that somehow Maggie got out, whether or not she was with Glenn Beth wasn't to sure of. Last she had seen Glenn he was on the bus and he was so sick that she honestly didn't know what she thought could have happened to him. She hoped that he was still alive and that Maggie and him were together. But if she or Glenn couldn't be with Maggie than Beth just hoped that she wasn't out there somewhere alone.

There were other people that Beth was sure had survived of course. For along time after they hadn't immediately found anyone from the prison alive she hadn't been able to believe that anyone else had survived. But as time passed and as the distance from their memories grew Beth slowly began to find hope in herself that others were alive.

She knew that Tyresse would have made it out, Sasha too. They were both tough and both of them had been on the road before. Beth hoped they were together but at the very least she was content with the assurance in herself that they were alive.

Michonne, if she had managed to get away from the Governor's people, she was still alive. She was the toughest person Beth had ever met, even tougher than Daryl although Beth would never admit to that to his face. If there was someone who could survive out there in this world it was her.

Those were the only four people that Beth honestly believed had made it out unhurt. She had seen Rick in his fight with the Governor, she hadn't seen the ending though so for all she knew Rick had died in the prison. While she hoped with everything she had that he had survived Beth honestly felt that him dying there would be strangely fitting. It was because of Rick that they had made the prison a home and it made sense that he would die when it did. And if he died there, he would be with Lori.

And her father.

Beth took a deep breath and leaned her head back against the wall. It had been so long since she had let herself truly think about her father. The pain of his loss, of watching him die so brutally, still haunted her everyday. It had been slowly getting easier, Daryl had a way of making her focus on the present rather than drown in the past. The pain never truly went away though, it just ebbed.

Thinking of Rick made her think of Carl. She hoped he made it out to but she didn't think he could have made it on his own. As tough as he was he was still a child. Carl needed someone to help him protect himself. Beth tore her thoughts from him, that still hurt to much too.

Beth wondered if she would ever be able to remember the happy memories she had at the prison without being haunted by ghosts and 'what ifs.' She stared unseeingly though the darkness as she counted off the time in her head. She still had two minutes to wait for the test results.

Her thoughts kept shoving the one face to her mind that she truly did not think she could deal with. Not here, alone, waiting for the results of a pregnancy test in the dark.

No matter what she tried to think of though her brain refused to corporate with her and the memory of Judith hit her like a bullet train, knocking the breath out of her chest and causing her to rock back on her heels. Beth shut her eyes tight as tears swarmed her vision.

Thinking of Judith was so painful it was close to the pain of thinking of her father. Beth had tried so hard to find Judith, to find any of the kids before she fled with Daryl but she had failed. She was always the one who took care of Judith the most, she loved her as if she really was her own daughter as so many of the newcomers always first expected. She was supposed to protect her and she had failed.

The guilt was always the worst part, the real reason why she couldn't even stand to say her name out loud. Her father's death was tragic and awful but no one's fault but the man who had butchered him. But Judith, to put it in Daryl's terms, that was on her.

Was she really about to bring another child into this horrible world when she had already cost one baby her life?

Beth let out a quiet sob before shoving her fist in her mouth. The last thing she needed was for Daryl to wake up and find her before she saw the results. Shaking her head at herself angrily she ran her fingers under her eyes to brush off the few stubborn tears that had managed to escape and pushed herself shakily to her feet. With trembling fingers she ran her hands through her hair before stepping froward and grabbing the plastic stick off of the counter. Holding her breath she flipped the flashlight back on, the high beam filling the room suddenly. Beth blinked spots out of her eyes as the bright beam of light hurt her vision. As her eyes adjusted Beth took a deep breath and managed to talk herself into looking down at the results she now held in her hand.

She blinked in surprise as she comprehended just exactly what the test was telling her. As she stared at the pregnancy test her breath left her lungs slowly and she was finally able to put a word to what she had been feeling, longing.


	12. Chapter 12

Chapter Twelve

His hand kept searching the worn surface of the couch for the warmth he was so used to accompanying his sleeping form, unaccustomed to coming up empty. Daryl frowned into the crease of his elbow where his head rested and slowly opened his eyes, blinking the aftereffects of sleep from them. Beth was not on the couch beside him where she had been the last time he saw her before they fell asleep. Sitting up he looked around the room that was flooded with the gray light of dawn and realized she was not there either.

Yawning he stood and shoved his feet into his boots before making his way out into the stockroom. Daryl headed into the storefront of the pharmacy happy to see that the store's windows had not been shattered during the storm last night. He had gone to sleep half expecting to be dragged out of it in the middle of the night by a group of walkers falling into the window in their frantic search to find the source of the noise that the thunderstorm was producing.

Stepping over a collection of shampoo bottles that had fallen onto the floor he felt his heart begin to beat a little bit more frantically with worry when he didn't immediately spot Beth. Telling himself that she wouldn't have gone far he made to turn and walk back to the break room when a small noise caught his attention. He found himself wishing he had grabbed his bow as he crept silently towards the sound. He darted around the register counter his fist raised and froze in confusion at the sight of Beth curled up on the floor.

Daryl lowered his fist sheepishly and looked down at her in confusion. Beth was leaning back against the counter, her knees drawn to her chest with her arms wrapped around them. Her face was buried into her knees and for a moment Daryl could not tell if she was awake or not. Then he recognized the small hitch in her breath that she always got when she was crying and he stepped forward to crouch down on the dusty tiled floor next to her.

"Beth." he whispered, wanting to reach out for her but unsure if she would want to be touched at the moment. A thousand thoughts crossed his mind at why she would be crying but considering their lives for the past few years all were equally as likely.

He heard her suck in her breath in surprise before she lifted her head from her knees. She did not look at him as she brushed at the tears still streaking through the dust on her face.

"I didn't hear you get up." she whispered, sniffling and running her sleeve under her nose before looking up at him. Her eyes were bloodshot, red from tears that had clearly been going on for a while.

Not sure of how to ask why she was crying without making her cry more Daryl reached forward and wiped away the few stray tears still lingering on her cheeks. Beth smiled at him sadly before leaning her face into his hand and reaching up to place her small hand over his.

"Wanna talk about it?" he finally settled on asking, struggling to keep his tone nonchalant.

Beth let out a humorless laugh and dropped his hand, shaking her head sadly. "No. Not just yet."

Daryl felt a surprisingly vivid flash of pain at her admission. He knew she didn't have to tell him everything but he thought that they were past the point of hiding things from each other. He didn't see the point of having secrets from each other anymore. She was all he had left in the world, if she started to pull away from him Daryl honestly didn't know how he would handle it.

She must have seen the flash of hurt Daryl felt before he could mask it away because she immediately reached forward and grabbed his hands. "I'll tell you. I promise." she looked up at him with her bright blue eyes and despite the tears Daryl could see the truth there. "I just need a bit longer to wrap my own mind around it, you know?"

Daryl shrugged before he removed his hands from hers and stood. Honestly, he didn't know. What could she need to wrap her mind around? It wasn't like anything new had happened to them since yesterday. Ever since the prison fell they had gone through everything together. Eventually they got through everything together. He just thought that was how they worked now.

He sighed and reached down to offer a hand to Beth. She took it slowly and let him help pull her to her feet.

"Daryl." she whispered, clearly able to see some of the inner turmoil he was feeling.

The worst part of it all was that he felt guilty for wanting her to confide in him before she was ready. Lord knew that he had gone completely stoic on her for weeks before lasing out at her in a manhandling fit of rage that most people would have held against him. Beth wasn't like most people of course and she had never mentioned the fit or held it against him in the slightest. He sighed to himself. He was acting childish, relationships were just still so new to him. Especially since they certainly played by different rules now. But he knew he couldn't be mad at Beth wanting to keep some things to herself, that was her right.

Straightening his shoulders Daryl turned back to Beth and leaned forward, placing a light kiss on her forehead. "Just tell me when you're ready." he said as he stepped back.

They spent the rest of the morning raiding the pharmacy for supplies before sneaking out through the back door and sprinting from the town. About a mile out Beth began to clearly favor her knee and despite the fact that she looked healthy in the morning light Daryl still feared she might be growing sick. He allowed them to slow to a walk but refused to let either of them speak until they were a few miles farther from the town. It was always hard to be sure if walkers had followed them out and speaking would only draw unnecessary attention to themselves which was the last thing that they needed.

As the day wore on the sun began to beat down on them with the first real heat they had felt in a long time. Daryl shed his coat and Beth smiled at him as she removed hers as well. The sunlight hitting his bare arms was one of the best feelings he'd had in a while. Spring was officially in full swing.

Near mid afternoon they began to pass signs for a vineyard and winery. As they neared the long dirt road that had green arrows pointing customers in the right direction Daryl finally broke the silence they had fallen into since the morning.

"Feel like picking some grapes?" he asked as he pointed towards the signs. Beth looked over at them, running her tongue over her lips before nodding.

They turned and headed down the worn dirt path the sight of the vineyard slowly coming into view as they progressed in silence. "I've never been to a vineyard." Beth said softly, she was clearly unsure if Daryl was still put off with her from their brief misunderstanding that morning. He wasn't and he had begun to feel guilty for overreacting, he chalked it up to having just woken up at the time.

"You lose." Daryl said with a snort. "Never much like the taste of wine." he continued with a shrug as he hitched his bag higher up his shoulder. It was significantly heavier after their raid on the pharmacy.

"I've never had wine." Beth admitted causing Daryl to frown at her, reaching over to tug on the end of her ponytail.

"Two for one? That's cheap, cheater." he teased as she giggled and pushed his hand away from her hair.

"I was just telling you. I wasn't trying to get points." she explained. Daryl felt pleased to see that the sadness from the morning had all but fled from her eyes.

"Well you should have saved that one. Would've been an easy point. This is way you ain't winning Greene." Daryl laughed as she stuck her tongue out at him.

"Its your turn." she said a few moments later and he furrowed his brow in thought. They had both been running low on obvious ones for a while.

"I've never dyed my hair." he finally said, silently congratulating himself when Beth groaned.

"Point." at his curious look she shook her head pinching the bridge of her nose between her fingers. "It was spray dye from a can for a football game. It was purple and a disastrous mess."

Daryl was still grinning at the mental image of Beth with purple hair when they came up on the first of the grape vines. Silently the pair began to pick from the first vines they came to, filling their pockets and Daryl's bandanna with the small fruit. When their pockets were bulging they turned to head back towards the road, there was no use risking wandering through the vines where they couldn't see far when they could get enough from one vine.

"Did you want to try wine?" Daryl asked as they were halfway down the road. He had been distracted during their game and had not thought of going into the actual winery. He pointed back over his shoulder. "We could check out the winery. Building might be clear."

Beth bit her lip and shook her head. "No that's okay." she whispered looking down at the dusty road under her worn out boots.

Daryl frowned. "Its really not as bad as I said. I just don't like it." he explained trying to erase the strange look suddenly on Beth's face.

"It's not that." she whispered running her hands up her arms as though she was fighting off a chill even though the temperature had not changed from its warmth.

"What is it then?" Daryl asked, finally giving into the curiosity that had been building in him since that morning. She didn't respond right away, she just kept walking and staring down at her feet. "Beth?" he asked suddenly worried, reaching over to grab her upper arm.

Beth suddenly stopped in her tracks and turned to face him. Her blues eyes were wide as she looked up at him. "I took a pregnancy test last night." she confessed.

Daryl blinked at her in surprise. That was certainly not something that he had been expecting her to say. A sudden connection came to him then and he cursed himself for not seeing it earlier. Lori had been sick for months when she was pregnant with Judith and one of Merle's friends often complained that his pregnant girlfriend kept getting sick in the mornings. Beth only ever seemed to get sick in the mornings and she showed no other signs of illness. He has skipped over the most obvious explanation and assumed she was deadly ill. Why hadn't he made the actual connection?

"I wanted to tell you before I took the test but I just didn't want to worry you if it was nothing." she continued on in a whisper, Daryl could hear the sound of tears in her throat.

The true meaning of her statement was not lost on him. "So its not nothing?" he whispered back to her softly. Beth let out a sob and rose her hands to cover her mouth as she shook her head frantically.

"Beth?" Daryl questioned, unsure of what her frenzied reaction meant. Slowly he reached forward and gripped her upper arms lightly. "Beth?" he repeated softly as his heart beat double time against his chest.

"I'm pregnant." she finally managed to choke out between sobs looking up at him desperately. "We're gonna have a baby." As she collapsed against his chest Daryl felt a swell of emotions rush through him. Strangely, his first thought was elation. He never excepted to be a father let alone to be a father with someone as amazing as Beth. The second thought was remorse as he thought of Little Ass Kicker and her almost certain demise. Third he felt anger at himself for not being more careful about this, this world was no place to try to raise a child. And finally he felt an overwhelming swell of terror.

Lori had died during childbirth and he was no doctor. If they couldn't find someone to deliver the baby and something went wrong he would have no idea what to do. Daryl wrapped his arms tighter around Beth and pulled her shaking body closer to him. Guilt began to seep into him with each of her wracking sobs. If something went wrong, she would die because of him. He might have just killed her.

He might as well dig her a grave now.


	13. Chapter 13

Chapter Thirteen

The few leaves beginning to form on the trees fluttered slowly in the light breeze. Somewhere high in the trees a few birds sang out to each other and the chattering of squirrels could be heard just under them. The sounds of spring were making the world come alive with noises around them but Beth and Daryl were silent as they walked down the highway, as they had been for the last two days.

Beth shot Daryl a look out of the corner of her eye and sighed at the stoic expression still in place on his face. They hadn't exchanged more than a few words with each other since she had told him that she was pregnant. She could barely understand what was going through her own mind and she didn't have the faintest idea of what was going through his. All she knew was that she wanted to talk about the fact that they were now going to have a child together. She wanted to come up with a plan, there was so much work that babies needed and she had no idea where to start.

She had no idea what to do anymore, whether she thought that they should keep on going to DC or if they should just find a safe place to be. She didn't know if they should work on trying to find a place for her to have the baby, or a doctor. Beth really didn't know much of anything at this point, not when it came to this. Sure she could take care of a baby, but only after it was born. The steps leading up to that were all new to her.

That afternoon they passed a rest area and Daryl motioned for them to take the exit down to it. Their latest food strategy was to check everywhere for vending machines or any food they could find. Daryl didn't like the idea of Beth eating meat that might not have gotten all the way cooked over the fire. Of course eating potato chips and crackers wasn't a very suitable diet for a pregnant women either but there was less risk involved with that. At the very least Beth had the prenatal vitamins she had taken from the pharmacy which would get her at least some of what she and the baby needed.

There were a few walkers milling around the rest area but after a few moments and some quick head shots they were all down and the pair continued past the fallen corpses. At least Daryl let her help out with those, she did not relish the idea of feeling useless because of this.

Luckily, the rest area had not only a vending machine with food but one with drinks as well. They had been running out of water for a while now and the few streams that they had stumbled upon had not contained water that looked fit for drinking.

Daryl broke the glass fronts of the machines as Beth kept watch, the sound of the breaking glass shattered the still air around them followed by the tinkering of broken glass as it hit the concrete. He pulled everything useful out of the machines and worked on shoving it into their bags which were now full with supplies. A few minutes later he stood and walked past Beth silently handing her her bag. Pulling the straps onto her shoulders and sheathing her knife she followed him back onto the highway where they continued on in a silence that began to feel louder and louder.

"Are you ever going to talk to me?"Beth finally snapped in anger as the day wore on. She could not handle much more of this silence, it was driving her crazier than her own tumultuous thoughts.

Daryl glanced over at her once before looking forward at the small town the highway was beginning to cut through. "What do you want me to say?" he finally grunted, not looking at her.

Beth stopped in the road and through her hands into the air. "Anything!" she cried, struggling to keep her voice down. She could feel Daryl beginning to slip into the person he had been when they had left the prison and she did not think that she would be able to handle it if he did, nor did she know if he would ever be able to come out of that shell again. "Daryl I know we didn't plan this. I know the timing of this is horrible but _please._ Don't make it any worse than it has to be." she pleaded stepping closer to him. How could he not see how much this was hurting her? As if worrying about their future, and the future of their child, was not enough he had to block her out. It was just all to much. She was barely holding onto her own sanity these past few days and the silent treatment was not making this whole thing any easier for either of them.

He looked down at her with guarded blue eyes. "Please don't shut me out." she pleaded, crossing her arms over her chest as if that would protect her from the blankness of his gaze.

"Maybe it'd be better if I did." he said quietly a small hint of pain in his voice as he looked away from her and down the road again.

Beth shook her head in confusion, what good would that do either of them? "Why?"

He shrugged still refusing to look at her. "It'll make it hurt less when it happens." he explained, his low voice thick with emotion.

She still didn't understand what he was talking about. It was like he was intentionally trying to not make sense. "When what happens?" she pressed, needing to understand where he was coming from in all this.

Daryl sighed in frustration. "When having the baby kills you." he finally snapped, looking at her with pain in his eyes.

Beth stepped backwards as if he had slapped her, her arms dropping to her sides. Her mouth fell open to protest, to say something but nothing immediately came to mind. At least now she finally understood what had been going through his head these past few days. All she had been worried about was how cruel it seemed to bring a life into this terrible world and what they were going to do about it while all he had been thinking about was whether or not she would survive the process. She'd be lying if she said that thought hadn't also crossed her mind but she had held onto the hope that for thousands of years women had given birth naturally. She knew what had happened to Lori but that was due to complications. Beth had refused to let herself worry about the birthing process because she knew that was something she was going to have to deal with no matter how much she worried about it. She wanted to save herself any extra terror and so had locked that worry away to deal with when the baby was coming. Clearly, Daryl had not had the same thought process.

Beth stepped forward and placed her head lightly on Daryl's arm. He shook it off and stepped back from her, gazing at her with a wild eyes and a pained expression.

"You could die because of this Beth." he whispered, his eyes boring into her with his intensity. "You could die because of me." he turned from her then, staring back down the road as if it held all the answers he would ever need.

Beth shook her head and pulled on his arm to get him to look at her. Not a single part of her believed that statement. She had had just as much of a say in them having sex, she had none the risks just as well as he had. No matter what happened to her, or the baby, none of it would be his fault. When Daryl finally complied and looked back at her she took his face gently in her hands, marveling at the familiar feel of the scruff on his cheeks against her hands.

"You did not get me pregnant alone." she insisted softly. "I was there too, its my fault too." Daryl closed his eyes and opened his mouth to say something but she placed a finger lightly on his lips to stop him.

"What happened to Lori does not happen to everyone." she whispered going straight to what she knew had to be his deepest fear. "I can survive this Daryl. Its going to be tough and its going to hurt but I can survive this." Daryl finally opened his eyes to look down at her. "I'm not going to leave you or this baby." she insisted, desperate to get through to him.

"You might not have a choice."he retorted back but Beth could hear a hint of him beginning to believe her there.

Beth smiled up at him sadly. "I'm a fighter. I'll fight." Daryl nodded sadly at her words reaching up to hold her hands, his eyes locked on hers. "Don't shut me out Daryl. Please." she whispered, her throat tight.

Daryl sighed and dropped her hands. "I won't." he whispered softly.

"Promise?" the word came out as a breath, barely even a whisper.

Daryl pulled her forward into his arms which she fell into gratefully. Though it had only been days it had felt like they had been on opposite sides of the world for weeks. "I promise." he kissed the top of her head lightly and Beth sighed into his chest. Finally something felt right again. It was all the hope she needed to keep going right now.

"We can do this." she whispered into his shirt before pulling back to look him in the eyes. "I know we can do this."

Daryl nodded and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. Though he still looked worried and unsure the closed off expression had left him and he did not seem quite as terrified as before. While she knew that he would likely hold that guilt and fear inside him until she had the baby she felt that it was a good start."We can do this." he agreed. They turned slowly to begin to walk down the road again.

"Are you happy, at all?" Beth asked in a quiet voice as they walked, almost afraid for the answer. Daryl was quiet for a moment as he mulled it over.

"Yea." he finally said causing Beth to look at him with a hopeful grin. He met her gaze with a small smile and a shrug."I guess I am."

"Me too." she whispered grabbing his hand. He squeezed her hand lightly and she felt the last remains of tension drain from her chest. Sure they still had a lot to figure out but they were on the same side now. Together they could do this, for all three of them.

They walked for a few minutes in silence, this time a much more comfortable one. As they passed a few houses Beth pointed towards one of them where a tire swing hung from a large tree, swinging lightly in the breeze.

"I've never been on a tire swing," she said lightly in an attempt to return them to their previous selves. Daryl followed the line of her finger and gazed at the swing before turning towards her.

"You loose." he admitted with a shrug.

"Really?" Beth asked hopefully, smiling when he nodded. She gripped his hand tighter and turned towards the swing pulling him after her. He protested lightly but let her pull him along. "We have to use this one then." she said happily as they approached the swing. Daryl groaned but followed her across the overgrown lawn before dropping his bag beside hers. "It'll be a first for both of us." Beth told him with a smile as Daryl held the swing steady and she carefully clambered onto it. He jumped onto it quickly before it began to move and she giggled, the toes of her boots just brushing the grass.

She grinned as he pushed off from the dirt and the tire began to swing lightly, slowly turning them in a circle as it went.

"As much fun as you expected?" Daryl asked lightly as he placed his hands over hers on the rope.

Beth nodded with a smile as the pain and tension of the past few days was erased between them. She leaned her head against the rope and looked at him. "Its even better."

Daryl met her smile without hesitation and she felt her heart warm. While their problems were far from over it seemed the worst part might just be behind them. They still had a lot of planning to do and Beth knew it was not going to be smooth sailing bringing a baby into this already troublesome world but she knew if Daryl was by her side she could get anything done. As a team, they would do this.

"I love you." she whispered looking into his eyes. Beth thought she heard the sound of a door behind her but she didn't turn around to check as Daryl leaned forward with a whispered."I love you too." Carefully he closed the distance between them and caught her lips with his.

His lips had just moved against her softly when all of a sudden a childlike cry broke the air behind them.

"Oh gross!"


	14. Chapter 14

Chapter Fourteen

The sound of the child's cry made Beth and Daryl tear away from each other at once and turn with open mouths to the front porch of the house. Standing at the top of the stairs stood a small child, dressed in dirty and torn jeans and a t-shirt that hung down to their knees. Their face was smudged with dirt and their hair was tangled in clumps around their ears. Daryl could not honestly tell if the child was a boy or a girl as it stood there and stared at the two of them with wide and disgusted green eyes.

Daryl grabbed hold of the ropes and clambered out of the tire swing, not tearing his eyes away from the child who did not look away from them either. From the corner of his eye he saw that Beth had not moved a muscle. She had a white knuckle grip on the ropes of the tire swing and her blue eyes were wide as she stared open mouthed at the child. The expression on her face was a strange mixture of disbelief, shock, and awe.

Before any of the three of them could say anything else the front door of the house opened with the unmistakable creak of rusty hinges and a tall woman stepped out of it. She was just as dirty as the child, with rips in the knees of her jeans and a long curly red ponytail that looked almost as tangled up as the child's short hair. Her boots made the loud clomping sounds of sizes to large shoes as she crossed the small wooden porch to scoop the child up into her slim arms.

"Roland!" she chided softly under her breath to the child began to struggle futilely in her arms. "How many times do we have to tell you to _keep your voice down?_" her voice took on a frantic edge as she reached the end of her question. Looking up her eyes scanned the yard, Daryl assumed for walkers, because the moment that her eyes landed on him and Beth they went wide and her arms slackened their hold on the boy.

"But mom!" the boy, Roland, cried loudly as he struggled against her. "They were_ kissing._" he said the last word in a whisper, as though it was a secret or a bad word that he was only supposed to use in the most direst of situations.

The mother looked down at her child, still open mouthed in shock before shaking her head and laughing slightly. Hearing a rustle of fabric behind him Daryl turned and saw Beth moving to climb off of the tire swing but it kept swaying in circles with her. Daryl leaned over to hold the swing steady as she scrambled out of it, seeming to be unable to tear her eyes away from the duo on the porch.

Daryl stepped slightly in front of Beth as the four of them eyed each other wearily. Roland still struggled against his mother's hold as the adults all tried to decide if it was worth it to talk to one another or if that would be an unwise move. Daryl glanced at Beth from the corner of his eye. He was surprised that she had not immediately started peppering the woman with questions, this pair was the first people that they had seen alive since the prison. Other than the men who had taken their farm house from them and the van that they once spied the tail lights of, these were the only other survivors they knew about in the world. The shock of that seemed to be preventing any of them from talking.

Beth had just opened her mouth to start what Daryl was sure was a long list of questions when the front door creaked open again and an elderly man stepped out slowly. As dirty as the others he walked slowly out of the house, the woman shifting Roland's weight onto one arm and silently turning to offer him a hand which he took with a look of gratitude. Beth and Daryl watched in silence as he slowly shuffled to the railing of the porch which he then leaned heavily against. In the back of his mind Daryl quietly wandered if the rotting railing was going to give out under his weight.

The old man surveyed them calmly with surprisingly bright eyes. "You two look as though you've been on the road for quite some time." he said breaking the silence of the yard. Roland had stopped struggling against his mother the second the old man had stepped out and he stared at him now with a look of reverence as his mother gazed down with wary eyes at Beth and Daryl

Daryl nodded assent slowly as Beth quietly spoke, having come out of her shocked trance. "We have."

"Heading anywhere particular?" the old man asked curiously.

"DC." Beth informed him as Daryl cautiously looked over his shoulder to scan the rest of the area. There was no one else in sight but he still felt a strange sense of nervousness. Yes the three people on the steps were the most nonthreatening people he had ever met but he still felt uncomfortable telling them where they were headed. They did not know how many more of them were still in the house and honestly Daryl just found it hard to trust other people ever since they had found Woodbury and the insanity in human form that was the Governor.

The old man let out a low whistle. "DC huh? That's quite a trek. You have family up there?" He seemed to just be genuinely curious and Beth seemed to be at ease so slowly Daryl felt his paranoia begin to lessen. The questions still made him slightly uneasy.

Daryl shook his head. "Nah." he said with a shrug. "Just thought we'd tour the country."

Beth looked at him with a raised eyebrow at his response but the old man did not seem to find it unusual. "Hell of a place to head to." he gestured towards the woman and child beside him. "We're from Richmond, its about two hours out of DC." he shook his head sadly. "We barely made it out alive. Place is over run with chompers."

"Chompers?" Beth asked in surprise. Daryl thought that had to be the strangest word for the walkers he had heard yet, biters sounded better than that.

"Well what do you call them?" the woman asked as she shifted Roland higher up on her hip.

"Walkers." Daryl said.

"Everyone's got their own words for them but the point is that they are crawling all over every major city. They probably outnumber the living by now." the old man sighed sadly and shook his head. "Whatever your real reasons are for heading to the Capitol I sure hope they're good ones. Heading there will likely be a death sentence for you."

"Well where are you headed?" Daryl snapped as he saw the crestfallen look on Beth's face. DC was the only plan they had right now and he wasn't going to let these people try to take it away from them. "Or do y'all just live here." he gestured around them at the falling down house.

Again the old man did not react to his rudeness he simply shook his head. "We're heading towards a town called Winston. We did the wandering aimlessly for a bit after we left Richmond but then we found these survivors that had heard of a safe place."

"Where are these other survivors?" Daryl asked, his hand itching to go for his knife. He really wanted to find out how many more of them were in that building. Just how safe was it for them to be out here talking?

The old man shook his head. "They went on ahead of us. We were just to slow for them. Or well, I was just to slow for them."

The woman shook her head and reached for the old man's arm. "Don't be ridiculous, it wasn't just you. They were in a hurry is all." she said looking back at Beth and Daryl with a shrug,

"Why?" Beth asked curiously as Daryl's muscles untensed a bit at that knowledge. Less people meant less danger.

"They had a pregnant woman with them." the woman explained. "She was going to have the baby in a few weeks and they had heard that there was a doctor there."

Daryl felt his heart leap and he saw Beth's eyes go wide with hope. "A doctor?" she asked quietly, her hand going unconsciously to her stomach. Daryl reached over and rested a hand on her shoulder causing her to look up at him with a small smile. Daryl's mind began to race, it all sounded far to good to be true. A place that not only had other survivors but a doctor? Surely it was all just a rumor or there had to be a catch. Nowhere was truly safe these days.

"You're pregnant." the woman said softly as she stared down at them. Daryl glared up at her lightly as Beth bit her lip and nodded.

"Not that far." she admitted with a shrug, looking over at Daryl with a small smile. "I'm only a few weeks."

"Travelings going to get pretty rough for you later." the old man said lightly as he reached up to scratch at his ear. "Might be better for you all to just find a nice safe place to settle down at. Maybe at Winston."

"What, you want us to go with you?" Daryl asked in disbelief. He was not the type of man that people who did not know him tended to like having around.

The old man smiled at the surprise in his voice. "Winston is still a few days away from here." he explained."I'm not as agile as I was once and she's got her hands full with Roland. Luke's got his hands more than full trying to protect all four of us at once."

"Luke?" Daryl asked casting his eyes around for this last person but not finding any sign of him.

The old man nodded and waved his hand carelessly. "He's from the survivors who told us about Winston. He offered to stay with us to help us get there. He's out hunting right now." he explained as he stared down at them."Point is, we've still got a bit of a ways to go and our chances of arriving at Winston unharmed would go up quite a bit if we had some more help getting there." As if he could sense the hesitance in the two of them he continued.

"You don't have to decide right away. Why don't you come in and stay here with us tonight? I would love to hear about how things are in other places." he kept his tone casual but Daryl could sense that he was truly desperate for them to help them get to their destination.

Daryl looked over at Beth who stared back at him with hopeful eyes. He couldn't deny that the idea of hearing about how other places were holding up was enticing. Besides, sleeping somewhere that wasn't on the cold dirt was always an alluring factor.

Sighing he shrugged at her and she beamed back at him. "We'd love to stay here tonight." she said happily turning back to face the people on the porch.

The old man smiled at her "Wonderful. I'm Oliver." he introduced himself before holding a hand out to indicate the woman with the child standing beside him. "This is Sarah and Roland. My goddaughter and her son."

Beth smiled at them and Daryl nodded as a way of greeting." I'm Daryl and this is Beth my." he found himself suddenly stumbling over the words in his mouth. How exactly was he supposed to describe what Beth was to him? She was the mother of his unborn child, yes, but somehow Daryl highly doubted that she would appreciate being introduced to someone that way. They had never felt the need to explain their relationship, there wasn't exactly a reason to ever try to define whats was between them. They loved each other, what else did they need to know? He thought about using the word girlfriend but that seemed to fall hopelessly short of the way that they felt about each other. As the pause stretched on to the point of awkwardness Daryl ran a hand through his hair. "Beth." he finished lamely dropping his hand back to his side.

Beth looked over at him and raised her eyebrows, a small smile forming on her mouth as the old man chuckled lightly.

"Well Daryl and his Beth," he said with a grin. "You two think about heading to Winston tonight. A safe place would be better than just wandering around aimlessly wouldn't it? Especially with that baby on the way."


	15. Chapter 15

Chapter Fifteen

The door hinges groaned loudly in protest as Beth slowly eased open the front door. Soundlessly Daryl followed her out into the chilly night air. Stopping at the bottom of the worn wooden steps Beth sank down to sit on the last step, running her fingers over the warped and aged wood.

She stretched her feet out before her, the grass felt cool and ticklish against her bare skin. Shivering, she pulled her legs up to her chest and wrapped her arms around her them for warmth. It was much colder than she had anticipated outside. Daryl wrapped his arm around her shoulders causing her to smile over at him. In the darkness they sat in silence for a few moments, both of them lost deep in their own thoughts.

"They seem nice." Beth finally whispered, looking over at Daryl in the small amount of light the moon and stars provided them with. She could never get over how many stars the night sky now held. Even after spending sixteen years on a farm she had never seen as many stars as she had started to see after the turn. He nodded at her statement and she looked out into the dark yard again. "Do you think that Winston is a real place?" she asked quietly, trying to keep the absurd amount of hope she had for that out of her voice but failing miserably.

She felt Daryl shrug and she looked over at him again. "Dunno." he said softly. "Seems almost too good." he admitted, to which Beth nodded. Earlier that night the burly middle aged man, Luke, had told them all he had heard about Winston. As his group had traveled there they had been told that the town was protected by two different fences that held armed guards to protect the townspeople from walkers, that there was a doctor, that children actually went to school and that people there did jobs everyday. Minus the fact that the people in the town were living behind fences and carrying knives it was a normal town with a normal life, as though the walkers didn't even exist.

Despite all of that, or perhaps even because of it, Beth could not shake the feeling that something was amiss. Perhaps it was because of what Woodbury had turned out to be or perhaps it was just the fact that it was so hard to trust anyone now. Even if Winston was as safe and great as Luke had made it sound she could not help but think about how the prison had had three fences, and they had all still fallen.

"What should we do?" Beth finally asked the question that both of them had been thinking of nonstop since Oliver had first told them of the possibility of a safe place. The idea of continuing on to DC now seemed absolutely ludicrous and silly, not to mention reckless. Whether they trusted the people in the house or not, whether they went with them to Winston or left alone that night the fact remained that Oliver was right. Cities were getting overrun. Beth and Daryl had seen this in even the small towns that they had passed through. Walkers were numerous and everywhere, it was going to be hard enough getting to DC and once they got there, then what? They still had to find somewhere safe where they could live and they still had to find someone to help deliver the baby, not to mention finding a safe place to raise it.

That was what Beth's mind kept drifting to, the baby. She knew that whatever decision they made tonight would not just effect them but the life forming inside her as well. She wanted to make a good choice for the baby so that when she gave birth they would be as safe as they could possibility make it.

"Why are we going to DC?" Daryl finally asked quietly causing Beth to look over at him. She opened her mouth to remind him about the spoon she had found in her bag and her need to not just wander around in circles but he continued talking, turning and catching her eyes with his.. "We wanted a destination right?"

Beth nodded, that was basically the sole reason they were heading to DC. She had known when she suggested that it was an insane idea, the distance alone should have stopped them from even attempting to get there. But both of them had needed something to focus on, something to think about besides how crappy the world had turned out to be. DC was a goal that was attainable but not very easy to reach for but both of them had still grasped at it with white knuckles.

"Well any destination is better than no destination at all." Daryl finally said with a shrug. Beth looked at his features in the pale light and clasped her hands together around her legs, biting down a smile as he repeated her own words back at her. However, she wasn't entirely sure if he meant what she thought he did so she asked him gently.

"Does that mean we're going to Winston?"She bit her lip at the mixed emotions that idea gave her. She wanted so badly to be somewhere safe, somewhere they could simply focus on living and not just on surviving. Beth wanted to be able to sleep in the same place every night, to fall asleep with the knowledge that they would all be safe in the morning. She didn't want to have to keep looking over her shoulder or making sure she wasn't talking to loudly. She just wanted to be able to breath without wondering if that was going to be the last time she did so.

Daryl sighed and rested his head on his hand, propping his elbow up on his knee. "You'll need a doctor." he explained quietly without looking at her. "I can't deliver a baby on my own Beth." he whispered the last part as though he was afraid she would be disappointed in him for admitting that fact aloud. She nudged him lightly before leaning back against his side, tucking her head into the crook of his neck and shoulder. Beth didn't want him to have to try to deliver the baby alone, she knew she didn't want just the two of them to try to bring the baby into the world. She couldn't think about giving birth, not just yet. Thinking about it filled her with such a fear it was as though she was trying to breath underwater.

"We shouldn't just go because they might have a doctor." she whispered as she caught her breath, staring out into the darkness at the tire swing that was blowing in lazy circles due to the light breeze. "We should go because its what we think will be best, for all of us."

Daryl was quiet for a few minutes as he thought this over. Beth stayed where she was and listened to the quiet thump of his heartbeat, letting it lull her back into a calm state.

"If its as safe as they claim then it is the best thing for all of us." he finally admitted decisively. Beth pulled away to look at his face. He looked calm and content with this decision, if he was regretting his choice she could see no hint of it in his face. He met her eyes and reached over to brush a loose strand of hair behind her ear. "If it really is what they say." he paused and Beth could hear her own doubts in his voice as he shook his head. "Then its the only place we should be trying to go."

Beth smiled at him and leaned over to kiss him lightly. She felt so relieved to have come to this decision, a small part of her heart had unclenched against all of her worries about safety and making the right choice. If both her and Daryl agreed it was a safe thing to bet on then they would face the consequences of that bet together. "So we're going to Winston then?" she double checked as she took his hand in hers.

"Looks like it." Daryl said with a shrug as he intertwined his fingers through her own.

Beth was quiet for a moment as she thought over the other worry that was plaguing her at the moment. "Are we going to go with them?" she finally asked him quietly.

Daryl looked over at her as he contemplated this. "I don't know how we'd get there without them." he finally admitted with a shrug. "They haven't told us how to get there." he reminded her.

"Probably so we wouldn't run off in the middle of the night and leave them to fend for themselves." Beth said with a smile. It was the same thing she and Daryl would have done if they had been in the other group's situation.

Daryl nodded in reluctant agreement as they thought over the people inside the house and the predicament that they currently found themselves in.

"Do you trust them?" Beth asked him lightly, even thought she felt she already knew the answer. She didn't trust them yet, they seemed like nice enough people but the fact was that she didn't know them. She didn't know if they wouldn't push her or Daryl into a herd of walkers to save themselves or that they wouldn't trick them or simply steal their things the moment they were both asleep.

"No." Daryl responded immediately with a shake of his head. "Do you?" he asked with a hint of disbelief in his voice.

Beth shook her head sadly. "I want to." she admitted weakly. "They seem so nice and they did tell us about Winston but." she paused as she thought over how to put what she was thinking into words. "Its just been you and me for so long that its hard to make room for anybody else." she admitted quietly as she picked at the frayed threads around the holes in her jeans. Beth wanted to trust the people in the house so badly it was almost ridiculous but she found herself incapable of doing so. If she was being honest with herself it wasn't just about trust, she didn't want to let someone else into her life or her heart if they were just going to hurt her when they left her, one way or the other. "We don't know them and they don't know us." she continued in the hopes of steering her thoughts away from the dark area they were heading towards. "They just need us for protection but what happens if our protection isn't enough? What happens then?" she asked softly, turning to catch Daryl's eyes with her own. She knew that she must have been staring at him with intensity but he met her gaze with the same level before he simply shook his head and gazed back out at the dark yard. He didn't have anymore answers than she did right now.

They sat in a still silence as they both contemplated their options. They could head on to DC and risk dying in one of the many herds on the way or in the city, they could head somewhere else in the hopes that they end up somewhere safe. They could look for Winston on their own and leave the group in the house to fend for themselves or they could work with them to all get there together. None of their choices were easy, as choices so rarely were these days.

"We don't trust them." Daryl finally said, breaking their silence. "But we need them." he looked over at her then and she squeezed his hand lightly. "And they need us."

"So we go with them to Winston?" Beth asked faintly as Daryl wrapped his arm around her again with a nod.

"There better be a fucking doctor there." he whispered as she leaned back against him with a giggle.


	16. Chapter 16

Chapter Sixteen

"And that my friend is why you should never drive a tractor drunk." Luke chuckled as he ended his own story and they continued on their slow pace down the highway. Daryl rolled his eyes at him, the man was full of ridiculous stories that he felt the need to share with everyone nonstop. He was almost never quiet which was grating on Daryl's nerves but he also never expected a response which was a good thing as Daryl rarely had anything to contribute to the conversation. At the beginning Luke had tried to get Daryl to trade him a story for a story but he realized fairly quickly that was a feat that was just not going to happen.

For four days the group had been making their slow progress to their so called promised land. The closer they got the more nervous Daryl felt. He wanted so badly for this to be a real place but he found he had no hope left for that. His whole life things had been promised to be safe, to be good, but they had never truly turned out that way. Daryl had learned over the course of his life that the better things were said to be the worse they actually were.

He wanted for Winston to be real, more than he had ever wanted anything. He wanted it to be a place where Beth and him could raise their baby, where they could have a doctor deliver the baby. He kept having nightmares that he would have to pull the baby out of her in the middle of the woods, dirt mixing with the blood on her legs as walkers surrounded them, drawn in by her screams of pain. Daryl would wake up with his heart racing and his breath coming out in frightened pants and he would have to double check that Beth was still there sleeping safely in his arms before he could even breath freely again.

As they spent more time with these new people Daryl began to hope that Winston was a real place for them as well. Despite his inability to shut up Luke was an alright guy. He had been a mechanic before the turn so at the very least Daryl and him had managed to have a few conversations about cars before that topic went stale. When Beth had tripped over a pothole in the road the day before Luke, who had been the closest to her at the time, had been the one to catch her arm and prevent her from falling over.

Then there was Oliver, who had not been kidding about his slow pace. They made very little distance in quite a long time and the first day Daryl thought his mind would explode from the agonizingly slow pace that he set. But Daryl had to hand it to him, the old man refused to be helped or carried. He leaned heavily on his worn wooden cane but he took every step on his own. The old man was full of stories as well but unlike Luke he knew which ones to tell and when to tell them.

The child, Roland, made Daryl nervous about what he and Beth should be expecting. The kid was a nonstop bundle of energy and almost everything that came out of his mouth was a question. He kept asking Beth how she had gotten a baby in her belly, he seemed to think that she had somehow accidentally swallowed one. His nonstop pestering that first day had led to his mother pulling him aside for a few minutes and when they came back he had looked between Daryl and Beth with such a horrified look on his face that even Daryl had chuckled.

Sarah and Beth had become fast friends. Whenever Daryl heard them speaking it was usually about child birth or parenting tips. Although Beth hadn't mentioned it Daryl could tell that speaking to someone with first hand experience on the birthing process had truly lessened her worries.

While he still didn't trust these people just yet Daryl could now turn his back on them without expecting them to put a knife in it. He did not expect them to be leading them into a trap or to kill them in their sleep anymore. How much farther that trust went though he was still uncertain. Beth and him kept a close watch on them all for any sign that they were not what they seemed but so far they truly seemed to be good people. Honestly, Daryl was pretty sure that Beth did trust them by now. She had always been more willing to believe the good in people than anyone else Daryl had ever met.

The longer they spent on the road and the more time they spent together the more he hoped that Winston was a real place, an actual safe space. He wanted these people to stop having to run and hide as much as he wanted him and Beth to have somewhere safe. This feeling worried him, he was not ready to care about anyone else just yet. He cared for Beth and for their unborn child but he was not ready to make room for anyone else.

These past few days he found that his thoughts kept drifting to the people from the prison. This was a dangerous area that he was not yet willing to go to. In the days and weeks after they had left the prison he had sealed all thoughts of them off. He had devoted his time to locking the memories of them away before the pain of not knowing what happened to them killed him. He had almost closed himself off entirely, he would have, had Beth not dragged him out of that darkness.

While he could now draw up small memories of the prison and its people he could not stand to think on them for too long. Every time Luke started to tell a story though, Daryl's thoughts began to drift into wondering who had survived and where they were now. The pain of these thoughts had not numbed at all so he would try to back away from them the moment they started.

"So you and Beth huh?" Luke asked quietly, dragging Daryl from his thoughts as he tapped his fingers against his thigh tunelessly.

Daryl looked over at him with a blank face. The pair was walking at the back of the group, keeping watch of their rear as Beth walked in the front of the group with Sarah. Roland was walking next to Oliver's slowly moving feet clearly in the middle of describing something very important to him, judging by his frantically waving arms.

Daryl eyed Beth where she walked with Sarah, evidently in the middle of a deep conversation. Her face was earnest with interest as the sun shone down on it, although her hand did still rest at the ready on her knife hilt.

"What about us?" Daryl asked protectively. He had been keeping a closer eye on Luke than he had been with the others. Luke was the only one that Daryl would have trouble overpowering and that fact made him dangerous. Daryl also he knew how men could think at times and he had wanted to make certain that Beth was safe from all types of dangers. Luke had turned out to be an alright guy, despite his need to talk. And luckily, Luke had taken zero interest in Beth. A fact that Daryl was fairly certain was due to the fact that Sarah and him seemed to have a bit of an interest in each other, at least judging from the looks they gave each other that Beth had pointed out to him the night before last.

"You two been together long?" Luke asked curiously, looking over at him. Daryl wondered if the man had finally run out of stories to regale him with. If that was the case, Daryl was almost remorse if it meant Luke was going to expect him to fill the silence now.

"Two and a half years." Daryl said with a shrug, he figured that number would be right give or take a few months. He couldn't honestly remember how long just the two of them had been on the road or how much time they had spent in the prison. Time had become such a strange concept since the turn. When one could die at any second it no longer made sense to keep track of how much time had passed. It only made it seem worse that that time could quickly be run out.

Luke let out a low whistle. "And you only just got her pregnant?" he asked with a slight chuckle. "Good job man."

Daryl's brow furrowed. "What?" he asked in confusion. He did not understand how getting Beth pregnant was a good thing. No matter what happiness the idea of having a child together brought to the two of them it was still a dangerous and risky thing to do. Besides, even if it was a safe thing to do Daryl highly doubted people would congratulate him for getting sweet Beth knocked up. He could only imagine how much worse it would have been for the two of them if the turn had never happened and he had still somehow met her and got her pregnant.

Luke looked over at him with a raised brow. "Well if you've been with her for that long I'm just surprised that she's only just now getting pregnant." he explained. "Didn't mean nothing by it."he said with a apologetic shrug.

Daryl realized then that Luke had assumed he and Beth had been together as a couple for that whole time. For some reason the idea of that amused Daryl a little. When he had first met Beth he had not thought of her in that way, in fact he rarely thought of her at all. Even after they had been traveling in the same group for months he had never thought that he would feel the way he did for her now. Shaking his head Daryl checked to make sure the road behind them was still clear. "We've been traveling together for two and a half years." he informed Luke. "We've only been together for six or so months."

Luke made a small noise of understanding. "Ah, so is she your girlfriend then?" he asked curiously.

Daryl stared at him as he wondered if Beth and him had been reading everything all wrong and he really was going to make a move on her. Luke was not looking over at her though, he was simply looking over at Daryl with a genuine look of curiosity on his face.

Daryl shrugged. "Guess so." he licked his lips as he thought how best to explain their relationship. He still hated the idea of calling Beth his girlfriend. That word did not accurately represent what she truly meant to him but he did not know what else he was supposed to call her. "We've never talked about it." he admitted with a shrug. He supposed that they might want to do that before they got to Winston if it meant saving himself from the type of awkward conversation he was having right now. In a way he hated that they would even have to define what they were. He loved her and she loved him, why couldn't that be enough for everyone else?

Luke shook his head as he stretched his arms above his head. "Well I guess that's one good thing about the end of the world man." he said with a grin.

"What?" Daryl asked in confusion. Did Luke mean that he and Beth got together? In truth Daryl thought that was the only good thing he had left in the world now that everyone from the prison was gone.

Luke clapped him lightly on the shoulder. "No more shotgun weddings. That would have been your life man." he laughed and clapped his shoulder again before trotting to the front of the group where Sarah turned to him with a smile.

Beth looked over her shoulder at Daryl with a knowing grin at the other couple's antics. Daryl managed to give her a small smile in return as he drummed his fingers against his crossbow.

If the turn had never happened and they had still somehow found themselves in this position, is that what would have happened? Was he supposed to marry her now? Daryl was surprised by the feelings that thought stirred in him.


	17. Chapter 17

Chapter Seventeen

The night air was alive with noise around them as crickets performed in harmony with the hooting of a night owl and the wind rustled the branches of the trees above them. The metal cans that they had strung up around the clearing where they now slept swung lightly in the breeze, hitting against each other with a small metallic clank every few minutes. Luke's soft snores filled the air, covering the small sounds that Roland made as he tossed restlessly in his sleep against his mother's side. Oliver lay close by them breathing steadily, his frail form stretched out on the hard packed earth.

Beth sat in silence as she leaned her back against the thick trunk of a tree as she took her turn to keep watch over the slumbering group. Daryl lay stretched out beside her, his head resting in her lap. Absentmindedly she ran her fingers through his overgrown hair as she surveyed the unmoving woods around them.

"Beth?" Daryl's voice was a small whisper that she barely heard over the breeze. Surprised, she looked down to see his eyes bright and intense on her. She had thought that he had fallen asleep ages ago when he had woken her to switch guards.

"What?" she whispered back, carefully checking that the sound of their voices had not woken up the others or caught the attention of any nearby walkers. Satisfied that they were alone she looked back down at Daryl, his face lit strangely by the small amount of moonlight that streamed down through the trees.

"What are we?" he asked, a pained and uncomfortable expression on his face at the question.

Beth looked down at Daryl in confusion, unsure of what he had meant by that broad inquiry. What were they to what?

"I don't understand." she confessed as Daryl slowly pushed himself up off the dirt and leaned against the tree next to her. He sighed as he leaned his head back against the rough bark. Beth watched him from the corner of her eye as she kept watch on the camp.

"I was talking to Luke earlier." he explained in a whisper. "He asked me if you were my girlfriend." he confessed shaking his head at this admission. He seemed uncomfortable simply saying the words aloud, Beth wondered how awkward he had been when Luke had tried to talk to him about this.

Beth bit her lip at the question. She supposed that was a enough valid question to ask about them, although honestly she did not like the sound of that word, girlfriend. It made her think of high school and dates to school dances. It drew up images of holding hands and going on dates. That word just seemed so juvenile when used to describe her and Daryl. However, if she had to describe what Daryl was to her she supposed that boyfriend would the word that she would use. The word tasted sour in her mouth but she still did not truly understand where Daryl was going with this. "So?"

"I was just wondering if you are." Daryl admitted with a slight shrug as he drummed his fingers on his knees, his voice unreadable.

Beth finally tore her eyes away from the camp and looked over at him in surprise. "Well I would assume that I am." she confessed looking at him as closely as she could in the moonlight. "Do you want me to be?" she asked jokingly.

"No." Daryl admitted with a slight shake of his head. Beth sucked in her breath. It felt as though he had just punched her in the stomach and she felt her heart begin to thump against the inside of her chest. She was not sure what he meant by that, was he going to call off whatever they had between them? Her mind began to run wild with what that one word meant.

"What?" she choked out, her voice tight.

The sound of her question caused Daryl to look over at her then and he must have read her thoughts in her face because he quickly grabbed her hand from where it rested in her lap. "That's not what I meant." he explained quickly as he intertwined his fingers with hers and Beth let out her breath in a relaxed sigh. Her heart slowly began to return to its normal tempo but she could still taste the aftertaste of fear in her mouth. "I want to be with you Beth." Daryl insisted, his voice earnest and his eyes steady and intense on hers. "Its just that the word girlfriend doesn't seem to fit right." he explained further with a slight shake of his head.

Beth leaned her head back against the rough bark of the tree and shut her eyes in relief. She had been so frightened that Daryl was about to end what they had between them. The thought of him abandoning her and their child like that left her speechless and senseless. She knew she was being silly though, Daryl would not leave them. Even if he stopped loving her he would not abandon them. He was not that type of man.

"I don''t the idea of calling you my boyfriend either." she admitted as she finally gained control over herself and her thoughts. It was true, just saying it aloud felt strange. It was akin to calling the walkers troublesome.

Daryl was quiet for a moment as he wrestled with his thoughts. "What do you think your dad would say?" he finally asked her under his breath. Beth looked over at him quickly in surprise. It was always rare for Daryl to mention any of the people from their past but even more so for him to mention her family unless she had brought them up first. In fact, it was strange for Daryl and her to be having this conversation at all. What did it matter what they called themselves as long as they were together?

"About what?" Beth asked him gently when he did not continue.

"Us." Daryl shrugged as he turned his head to look into her eyes. "What would your father say about us?" he repeated in a whisper.

Beth bit her lip as she considered this. She had often thought about this late at night when she could bare to think about her family. She would imagine what it would have been like if the turn never happened and her family was all still alive. She would come up with crazy scenarios of how her and Daryl had met and then dream up introducing him to her family. Other times she would imagine running into Maggie again and telling her about her and Daryl's new found romance and their child. She imagined the hug Maggie would wrap her in so often that at times she could almost feel the phantom touch of her sister's arms around her. No matter what she imagined one thing was always the same. "I think he'd be happy for us. I think all of my family would be happy for us." she finally admitted out loud. It was true, she truly believed that they all would have been. Her father and Maggie had liked Daryl, eventually. And all her parents had ever wanted was for their children to be happy. Shawn might have taken more swaying than the others but that was only because he was supremely protective of Beth. But Daryl made her happy and he kept her safe, her family would have been happy for them on those facts alone.

"Even about the baby?" Daryl asked in disbelief as he looked over at her with a furrowed brow. He did not seem to agree on the idea that her family would have been very pleased with the two of them being together but Beth knew they would have been, eventually.

"Yes. I think that they would have been plenty mad at first." she admitted with a slight grin at the thought of how her family would have reacted to her being pregnant at such a young age. She had always been the good child, never in any trouble. This would have shocked all of them speechless. "But they would have gotten over it and been happy for us. For all three of us." she said softly as she ran her hand lightly over her stomach. It still felt flat to the touch but she liked to imagine that the baby, even tough she knew it was still only developing cells at the moment, would be able to feel it and take some comfort from her touch.

Daryl took a deep breath as though he needed to steady himself before asking his next question. "Do you think your father would have made us get married?" he asked, his voice very carefully toneless. "You know, have a shotgun wedding?"

Beth blinked in surprise and turned to stare out into the dark woods. That was never something that she had thought of, even in her daydreams. To be honest, she wasn't sure what her father would have said, at least not now anyway. If this had been before the turn or if the turn had never happened like she preferred to daydream of, that is exactly what her family would have expected to happen. The world was a lot different now though, and her family was a hell of a lot smaller. Although it was growing.

Running her fingers lightly over her stomach she shrugged. "I don't know." she admitted, turning to look over at Daryl's slightly illuminated face again.

Daryl nodded slowly and he seemed to tighten all of his muscles, as though he was expecting an attack. "Would you have wanted a wedding?" he asked, his voice causal..

Beth licked her lips as she thought this over. "I used to." she admitted with a small smile and a shake of her head. "I used to dream of the big church wedding with the white poofy dress and all these bright flowers." she let out a slight laugh at the simple daydreams that she used to have. "It all seems so stupid now." she whispered as she looked off into the dark again, her eyes searching the blackness for any hidden dangers. She found it so silly, the things she used to waste her time with thinking about.

She felt Daryl look over at her in confusion. "So you don't ever want to be married?" he seemed to be struggling to keep his voice casual and Beth looked over at him in genuine astonishment. She had never thought that Daryl would be one to want to talk about weddings and marriages. He always seemed so tough and she always thought that all men found weddings to be silly and frivolous affairs.

"Well a wedding seems so useless now." she explained as she thought over how best to describe her feelings. Weddings were for families and friends to see and share in the love of a couple and all of her family and friends were dead or gone except for Daryl. Beth was a little bit breathless as she tried to put her thoughts into words, where was he going with all of this? "A marriage is still something that is worthwhile these days." she finally settled on saying. She meant it to, a marriage showed how much people loved each other, that they were committed. Strangely enough when Beth had imagined weddings as a child she had never bothered to imagine a groom or think about the true reason for a wedding. She had only ever wanted to plan out the ceremony and the party.

"Would you want to get married?" Daryl asked looking away from her as he picked absentmindedly at the grass. Beth felt her heart begin to speed up again as she began to realize what he was truly trying to ask her."You know, to me?" he stared down at the grass and refused to look at her which she was grateful for as her lungs seemed to be unable to hold any oxygen and she must have looked like a gaping fish at the moment. He would have draw back his proposal at the sight of her. "Not now obviously." he continued, clearly trying to fill her silence. "But I dunno one day?"finally he looked up at her and she managed to catch her breath and her senses enough to smile at him. Still speechless she managed a nod. "One day." she found her voice enough to whisper squeezing his hand gently.

"One day." Daryl repeated back like a promise as she grabbed his face and pulled him down to kiss her.


	18. Chapter 18

Chapter Eighteen

"Do you think they'll have toy cars? I hope they have toy cars." Roland said, breathless with excitement as he tugged on Sarah and Beth's hands in an attempt to get them to walk faster.

"They might. We'll just have to wait and find out love." Sarah said lightly. Catching sight of her son's frown she tugged on his hand. "Do you want to fly?" she asked excitedly. Roland nodded enthusiastically, his frown immediately turning into a smile as he jumped off the ground and Beth and Sarah pulled him into the air. As his feet dangled in the open space he began to giggle loudly and the adults all quickly scanned the road around them to make sure they were still alone.

All of them were on a bit of an edge. Earlier that morning they had run into a small pack of walkers. They had been passing through a small town and five walkers had stumbled out from behind a building and into their path. Thankfully they had been able to put them all down quickly without any problems but they had all been uneasy ever since.

The past few days they had been coming across more and more walkers. Daryl wasn't sure if it was because they were passing through more cities or if it was due to the fact that so many people had died since the turn. If it had been up to him they would have traveled off of the roads entirely but unfortunately that was the only way they knew how to get to Winston and Oliver would not have been able to handle off roading.

If the directions that Luke and his previous group had been told were accurate than they were closing in on Winston and, given their current pace, would be there by nightfall of the next day. All of them were bundles of nerves and excitement as they grew ever closer.

As they grew closer to where Winston was supposed to be Daryl found himself looking over his shoulder every few minutes. He wasn't entirely sure what he was looking for but it wasn't only walkers. He couldn't seem to shake the feeling that they were walking into a trap, but he seemed to be the only one in the group with that sense of deep unease. He chalked it up to his natural distrust of people mixed in with the all to real memories of Woodbury and the madhouse that turned out to be. Beth and the others did not seem to share his unsettled feelings although he knew that Beth was not one hundred percent sure that they would find sanctuary at the end of this road. She just had more faith than he did that not everyone was a terrible person these days.

He had to admit her trust in others had not let them down yet. In the week that they had been traveling with this small group both of their lives had been saved by its members. That morning Daryl had been reloading his crossbow when a walker managed to catch a hold of his backpack, pulling him towards its gaping mouth. While he believed he could have gotten out of the hold unharmed he hadn't even had to try as Sarah had shoved Roland into Oliver's arms and slammed her knife into the back of the walker's skull before Daryl had even begun to struggle.

Two days past Beth had been surprised by three walkers at once as she gathered water down in a stream. She had got one down and was wrestling with the other two when Oliver, who had been nearby, beat one's head in with his cane as Daryl shot down the other one, alerted by the noise.

It was undeniable that the group had needed Daryl and Beth's help, he highly doubted that they would have made it even this far without their assistance. But they had not left either of them to fall either and Daryl knew Beth was sold on them now. She would trust them now until they gave her a reason not to and Daryl was slowly beginning to feel the same way. The closer they got to Winston the more worried he was that they were going to walk into a trap. Because if it came down to it, no matter how much he liked or was beginning to trust these people, he would only worry about trying to save Beth. He would help the others if he could, but not if it put Beth or him in danger. A small part of him hated himself for that, he didn't want to ever leave anyone behind again. But the larger part of him knew that was what would have to be done. He had to protect her and the baby.

"What's wrong?" Beth's voice was soft next to him and he looked over at her with a jolt. He had been so deep in his worries that he had not noticed her and Luke switching places by Roland or her falling back to walk by his side. He tried to push his worries to the back of his mind as he shrugged at her. Daryl did not like sharing his fears about the town with her because he saw how much she hoped that it was real and good. He knew that if he told her his fears she would begin to doubt its safety as well, she might even suggest that they not continue heading there which no matter how much he worried he was unwilling to do. They had to check the town if only for the rumor that there was a doctor there.

Beth frowned at him but thankfully she did not press him for anything else. He knew she still had some doubts, as they all did, but he was grateful that she did not insist on hashing them out with each other. That would only make their trip seem even more foolhardy then it did already.

"So what do you hope Winston has?" Beth asked lightly continuing on a conversation that Roland had started the past day. He made everyone tell him what they most wanted Winston to have before telling them all that he hoped there was an ice cream store and a bounce house. Daryl felt that the kid had his hopes way to high but thankfully his mother managed to talk his hopes down to a chocolate bar and a swing set. She told Daryl later, after spying his inquisitive look, that it was much easier to let his hopes down easy before they were later crushed, especially when she knew what he hoped for was impossible.

"Oh and you can't say a doctor!" Beth exclaimed poking him lightly in the shoulder with a grin. "That would be cheating."

Daryl sighed at this and raked his brain. Besides a doctor and no one trying to kill them he really had no hopes for this supposed safe town. He knew the others did, whether it was small things that they hoped the town had there or simply getting to sleep on a bed. But Daryl didn't really mind sleeping on the ground if it meant he wasn't walking into a death trap, all he really wanted was for Winston to be as safe as was being promised.

He made a noncommittal noise in response which caused Beth to frown at him.

"No don't!" she repeated his mumbling noise back at him which caused him to smile slightly. "What do you want them to have there?"

"What do you want there?" he asked instead of answering, hoping to distract her from his lack of response. She pouted slightly at him to show that his plan had failed but after a quick look behind them to make sure they were still alone she responded.

"I want there to be a piano." she admitted sheepishly. Seeing his confused look she blushed. "I really miss playing. Its stupid and selfish but." she shrugged. "That's kind of the point of the game isn't it?"

Beth turned to look at him with wide blue eyes and Daryl found himself nodding in agreement. He would like to hear her play the piano but he doubted she would let him get away with using that as an answer so he tried to come up with something that he really wanted to be there.

Truly he already knew what he wanted, besides the safety and a doctor. He wanted Rick to be there. Or Glenn, or Michonne or really anyone from the prison. He wanted there to be someone there who knew what had happened to the others, who could set his and Beth's minds at ease.

Daryl knew that was not going to happen however so he did not even entertain the thought for that long. If they were going to find other survivors from the prison they would have found them by now. They would have found them when they had scoured the woods surrounding the prison for weeks. They would not find them in a town in North Carolina, they were a long way from Georgia and the prison after all. He did not mention these thoughts to Beth because he did not want for her to get her hopes up that there would somehow be prison survivors there. As Sarah had told him earlier, it was better to just stop impossible hopes and dreams before they really got started.

Trying to think of things that might actually be at Winston that he might want Daryl found himself only thinking of things such as safety, or a roof, or a change of clean clothes. But these things had all been said yesterday and were unanimous with everyone. He could say a hot shower but he wasn't going to let his own hopes get up that high, besides he'd settle for a cold shower these days.

Sighing he tapped his fingers on his belt and cast a furtive look behind them, Beth walking patiently at his side. "I don't know." he admitted with a shrug. She opened her mouth to protest but he cut her off. "I've never been good at this type of thing."

Beth's protest died on her lips as she looked at him in confusion. "Wait, was that for points?" she asked, her brow furrowed.

Daryl shook his head no and she sighed.

"Aren't you excited at all to get there?" she asked quietly kicking lightly at the road with her scuffed boots.

Daryl grunted noncommittally. He had no idea how to accurately describe how he felt about getting to Winston because he had no idea what to expect there. He would worry about what they had to offer them after he knew they weren't going to try to kill them first. After he knew that they weren't just chasing down a rumor.

They walked on in silence for a few minutes before Beth spoke."I was thinking." Beth paused as Daryl looked over at her. She bit her lip lightly before she continued in a rush. "If it really is safe we should get married there."

She kept staring ahead and did not look at Daryl even when he continued to stare at her. That was the first time either of them had mentioned his marriage proposal from a few nights ago. He had begun to think that she did not want to marry him after all or that they were just not going to talk about it again. But if Winston was safe then she was willing to marry him, maybe as early as tomorrow. Daryl was surprised by how pleased this actually made him, he had never once thought that he would have children let alone be married. Those types of thoughts had never entered his mind before the turn and they were certainly never there after it. Sometimes it still amazed him how much being with Beth had changed him.

Daryl cleared his throat before responding. "I found what I'm hoping for then."

Beth turned to look at him with a smile that he returned easily.

"I've never thought about marriage before you." Daryl confessed to her causing her to blush as she grinned down at her shoes.

"Point, but it was mostly just about the wedding." Beth tapped her finger on her lips before she turned to face him. "I've never wanted anything as much as I want Winston to be safe." she whispered, her voice suddenly serious.

Daryl squeezed her hand lightly as he confessed, "Me neither."


	19. Chapter 19

Chapter Nineteen

"There it is! There it is!" Roland cried enthusiastically as he struggled to break free of Sarah's hold on his hand. They had just crested over the top of a small hill and perhaps half a mile away a small town lay stretched out before them. From the corner of her eye Beth saw Daryl's grip tighten on his crossbow and she reached over to squeeze his elbow encouragingly with a small smile that he did not return. His face was closed off with worry, an emotion she could understand because she was not without her own fears at the moment.

Slowly the group headed down the hill on the worn road, the town of Winston laying clustered at their feet. Beth could count roughly twenty buildings and houses sectioned in a small square formation. The tall spire of a church rose up from the middle of the town like a beacon guiding travelers to it. The town was fenced in by a wooden beam wall with a chain link fence in front of it. The group walked on in silence, none of them daring to take their eyes away from the sanctuary they all hoped they were heading for.

"This road is used a lot." Luke remarked quietly, tapping his boot on a broken slab of asphalt. "Big trucks to I'd guess."

Daryl made a small noise of agreement and Beth glanced over at him in worry. He looked ready to go on a firing rampage at the slightest provocation. As they continued on in a slow silence Beth shoved her hands deep in her pockets where she crossed her fingers that whatever they were about to walk into was a good place.

That last half of a mile to the fence had to be the longest walk Beth had ever taken. The sun was beginning to set behind them and the group approached Winston in the steadily approaching darkness.

Finally, after what felt like hours but had only been minutes they reached the fences. There were no walkers hovering near it like the swarms that had attached themselves to the prison but Beth did not see any signs of people beyond the fences either.. She twined her fingers through the fence links and peered through the chains to the wall behind it.

"Do you see anyone?" she whispered to the group pressing close around her. Daryl shook his head slowly, his fingers white from his grip on his bow.

"There!" Sarah whispered as she pointed to a few places down on the wall where a figure clad in ill fitting camos was clambering up. They were clearly standing on something behind the wall as the wall itself looked far to flimsy to hold up anyone's weight. A small part of Beth's mind began to wonder how good these fences actually were at protecting the town from walkers. Seeing as Winston was on the outskirts of two metropolitan areas she didn't understand why they wouldn't have better structured security on the outside.

The person finally managed to crawl up onto their post where they stood and stretched their arms over their heads. They ruffled their hair before turning to scan the area around them. As they turned and faced the group Beth saw that it was a young boy, perhaps only a few years younger than her. The moment his eyes fell upon them his mouth dropped open and his hands dropped to his sides where a gun was resting at his hip. Beth saw Daryl raise his bow and place his finger on the trigger but she held up a hand to stop him as the boy suddenly let out a straggled yell.

"Luke!" his voice was the cracked cry of a boy just entering puberty but the joy in it was still unmistakeable.

Beth watched with her heart in her throat as Daryl slowly removed his finger from the trigger as Luke let out a laugh of joy from behind them.

"Evan!" he cried in happiness. "You gonna let us in our keep us out here as walker bait?!"Beth smiled slightly to herself at how easy the group had picked up on the word walker.

"The gate's this way!" The boy, Evan, called pointing to their left as he began to climb back down whatever he was standing on.

The group quickly made their way around the chain link fence until they came upon a sliding gate which was closed shut with a thick chain and a padlock. They stood and waited in an anticipated silence, Sarah bouncing on her toes as she tried to hold a struggling Roland close to her.

"He was with your group?" Beth asked Luke quietly as they waited impatiently. She supposed them knowing each other had to be a good sign. If Luke's old group was here unharmed then perhaps Winston really was the safety that it promised to be.

Luke nodded with a laugh. "Yea, crazy little shit. I can't believe they made it." he shook his head. "But we did too so I guess it can't be that hard of a journey huh?" he chuckled to himself as he clutched onto the fence with one hand.

Oliver snorted as he leaned his weight heavily onto his cane. "Speak for yourself. I have blisters on my hand from this damn cane." despite his words a small smile was beginning to form on his face. The sight of a familiar face had made everyone begin to feel a little bit more at ease although Beth did notice that Daryl still had not lowered his cross bow.

Beth placed a hand lightly on his shoulder, turning her back on the others to face him. "Its going to be okay." she whispered to him trying to get him to look at her. For a moment he kept staring straight ahead at the fence but slowly he turned his head and met her eyes. She was surprised by how much emotion she saw there before he managed to close himself off again. He looked so frightened. Beth knew that he was afraid that this would be like Woodbury but she had not realized how deep that fear went. The fear in his eyes haunted Beth for a moment until a noise from behind her tore her gaze away.

There was a rattling from the other side of the fences and the wooden gate opened up, three figures spilling forth. Evan had been joined by a middle aged woman and a man who looked to be close to Daryl's age.

"Luke!" The woman cried in joy as she ran forward to the chain link fence and began to unlock the padlock, "It really is you." it sounded as though there were tears in her eyes as she began to unwind the chain with trembling fingers.

"Hey there Mindy." Luke said, the grin on his face stretched wide. "Did everyone make it?" he asked breathlessly as she finished unwinding the last few coils.

Mindy shook her head sadly, her fingers stilling on the metal for a moment as she paused. "We lost Jon and Katy." she whispered her voice tight. Luke swore as she pulled the fence open with a rattle and he ducked inside of it quickly to pull her into a hug Evan joining them immediately. As the rest of the group wandered inside the other man shut and locked the fence behind them and Beth saw Daryl's jaw clench.

"We're so glad you all made it here." The man said calmly as he turned around to face them. "My name is George and I am one of the people in charge here at Winston." he informed them. He eyed Daryl's grip on his bow and shook his head slowly. "You don't need to be afraid. We won't hurt any of you."

Daryl did not look very inclined to believe him but Evan gripped Luke's arm tightly. "Its true. Things are great here. They taught me how to fire a gun and their teaching Jill to read."

"That's great kid." Luke said ruffling the boy's hair affectionately.

"We mean none of you any harm." George repeated looking at each of them in turn but Beth had a feeling he was mostly speaking to her and Daryl. Luke was clearly at ease with his friends and Sarah, Roland and Oliver all simply looked happy to be behind one of the fences. Daryl however still looked ready to run, or at the very least fire a bolt into someone. Beth herself felt uneasy, not because of the town, but because she was unsure of what Daryl's intentions were. He continued to stare George down his bow still held at the ready.

Beth turned her back on George and the others and leaned close to Daryl's ear. "We should give them a chance. Everything looks okay right now." Daryl did not look at her or move to lower his bow. "Please Daryl." she whispered reaching over to rest a hand on his arm. "Please." she pleaded trying to catch his eyes.

She felt his muscles tense under his touch and after a brief pause he slowly dropped the bow to rest by his side. George nodded at her gratefully as Beth squeezed Daryl's arm in appreciation.

"Well, let's get all of you a tour! I assume you'll all be staying?" he asked as he turned away from them to slide open the wooden gate.

The group walked through in silence and appraised the area around them. As Beth had counted earlier there were twenty or so buildings in the enclosed area but up close she could see that many off them were several stories tall, some had old signs in front of them boasting that they were restaurants or shops, there were a few apartment buildings that she could see on this block alone.

George walked them through a couple of streets before he slowed down at a small circle of green grass where several picnic tables rested. There was a small set of playground equipment at the end of it and Beth saw Roland begin to beg his mom to let him go and play.

George clapped his hands and turned to face them, appraising each of them in turn.

"Everyone who lives in Winston pulls their own weight." he informed them solemnly. "That will be expected of all of you as well. We all know how tough it is out there and what it can do to people. We will not tolerate that type of behavior in here." His eyes lingered on Daryl as he spoke and Beth felt a shimmer of rage overcome her although Daryl did not so much as blink at the man. "If you do something that the town finds unbecoming or if you hurt someone, put someone in danger, you will be cast out of Winston." George shook his head sadly as he looked at them. "This world is hard but that doesn't mean you have to get hard with it."

Beth silently disagreed, if she had not hardened up she never would have survived in this world. It had taken her dragging a shard of broken mirror across her wrist before she realized that she had to get tough or die. And she really did not want to die, not yet. It would happen, one day, but she was determined now to go down fighting. George was right on one thing though, this new world was hard. But if one expected to live in it, to survive, they needed to be hard too.

She did not say anything as George went on to inform of the various structure: that Winston had, their school, their hunters, their planters. Beth simply stood and listened, watching from the corner of her eye as Daryl's muscles slowly began to untense.

When George finally reached the end of his spiel he pointed to the apartment building behind them. "That one still has several empty spaces. You're welcome to any apartment you find. Simply write your names on the outside of the door and its yours. Any questions?"

Beth blinked at him in astonishment, she had not been excepting for her and Daryl to get an apartment or any type of home. She had been hoping for a roof and a dry patch of floor, maybe a mattress if possible. Daryl and her exchanged a surprised look before she smiled in happiness and turned to ask the two most important questions she could think of at the moment.

"Is there a doctor here?" she asked holding her breath in anticipation. As George nodded she felt almost breathless with relief, and she clutched Daryl's hand in a grip he returned with equal fervor.

"Yes, Penny was actually a pediatrician but she is adapting quite well to the wounds and troubles she has had to deal with. She actually delivered a baby a few weeks ago, her first one ever."

Beth let out a little laugh and she was happy to see that Daryl's face was beginning to stop look so stoic as Sarah gripped Beth's arm in happiness.

"Any other questions?" George asked shoving his thumbs though his belt loops.

Beth looked at Daryl and rose an eyebrow in question. He seemed to understand what she was asking without her having to ask which made her heart stutter with joy. Sure that she was making the right decision she turned back to George and asked him breathlessly. "Is there any type of pastor or preacher here?"

George looked a bit confused by her question before he nodded. "Yes, Pastor Clyde is here. He was one of the founding members of Winston. Why?" he asked curiously, baffled by her question as was the rest of the group who was looking at them with raised brows.

Bet h squeezed Daryl's hand again, he returned the pressure as the emotionless look slowly began to leave his face as she turned back to George."Because we want him to marry us."


	20. Chapter 20

Chapter Twenty

Kicking the door shut with his boot Daryl buried his hands in Beth's hair as his lips moved softly against hers. He backed her into the small apartment they had been given by Winston as her fingers began to tug at the buttons on his shirt. She pushed the blue fabric off of his arms, which the moment they were free of the cloth, he wrapped tighter around her body as he walked them to the couch. Beth giggled breathlessly as he twirled her around and sat on the couch, pulling her down onto his lap.

Straddling him Beth kissed him tenderly before pulling away to rest her forehead against his. Daryl rested his hands on her hips as they both struggled to catch their breath.

Beth giggled again and Daryl felt a small smile begin to form on his face at the look of pure happiness she was giving him.

"What?" he whispered reaching up to tug her hair down from the messy bun it resided in. Wavy blonde strands fell down to curtain her face as she beamed at him.

Beth shrugged, trying to bite back her radiant smile but not quiet managing to contain it. "I've just." she paused and closed her eyes for a moment before opening them and capturing him in pools of blue. "I've never been so happy." she admitted, her voice barely above a breath.

Daryl slipped his hand behind her neck and pulled her closer to him, his lips brushed against hers as he whispered. "No points for you, Mrs. Dixon."

He felt her smile against his lips before she rose her hands to cup his face. He could feel the cold metal of the ring on her left hand against his freshly shaved skin and felt his heart begin to beat faster at its touch.

It had been three days since they had arrived in Winston. They had spent the majority of them trying to assess whether or not the town really was all it was hyped up to be. So far, no matter how hard Daryl looked, everything actually seemed to be genuine. The people there really were normal and just trying to find a way to live.

The town housed roughly forty people of various ages and from multiple locations. The word of Winston only ever got round by word of mouth or by people stumbling upon the town. Since the only ways one could get into Winston were by one of two roads (one of which cut through the state capitol Raleigh and was deemed impassable by others or the one that their group had traveled up on) or through the woods on either other side of the town. Because of this almost no one ever came to Winston by accident.

The town had been sectioned off by the fences when Raleigh had been cordoned off by the military to be a safe zone. Pastor Clyde had decided that grouping that many scared people in one place was nothing but a bad idea so he and four other people had stayed in Winston, cordoned off the most valuable section, and waited.

In the beginning people found them as they fled Raleigh after it was overrun. Some people stayed in Winston, others left to go and try to find their family or friends, back when people still had the hope of doing so. They spread the word of Winston and slowly others found their way there. Some people stayed, others came and went. As time passed, more and more of those who managed to make it inside the gates stayed inside. The world outside the fences was far to dangerous to want to live in.

Winston managed to survive not only because of its citizen's need for a safe place but because the people in charge made sure everyone felt like a valuable part of the community. Their small group had all been given job duties for the duration of their stay, however long they decided that would be. Oliver was to help out with the meal preparation, he would be able to sit and help cook and clean food. Despite the slowness of his walk his hands still worked fine and he seemed to be happy to be considered useful. Sarah, who had been an engineer before the turn, was set to work helping George and a few of the other townspeople come up with ways to reinforce the fences and other town structures. Luke had joined some of his old group on the supply run team. Beth was to work at the school where Roland would join the other children and Daryl was to work guard duty on the fence and join the hunting team as his crossbow was far quieter than a gun.

As the days past and no one pulled a gun on them or tried to feed them to walkers Daryl slowly allowed himself to trust the town, a large part of that trust formed due to Beth's insistence that there was still good people left in the world. Without even needing to discuss it they decided to stay on in Winston and spoke to the Pastor to marry them in the old church that sat in the center of Winston's fenced in area.

That morning Daryl had woken up with Beth in his arms on their very own bed with the knowledge that by the end of the night they would be husband and wife. As they dressed for work he kept casting her weary looks, sure that at any moment she was going to announce that she had changed her mind, that she didn't want to marry him after all.

After a quick kiss they had parted ways to their separate jobs where Daryl had spent his hours on guard duty standing on the top of an RV at the fence line, shooting down the walkers that stumbled out of the city towards them. A job that usually seemed to pass by quickly seemed to drag on for days until finally Evan showed up to relieve him of his turn. The boy had clapped him on the shoulder, a move that would normally have gained him a glare, but as he wished Daryl good luck all he could do in response was nod. Daryl walked the few blocks back to the apartment building where he and Beth lived amid numerous hand shakes and calls of congratulations. He had never realized exactly how quickly news spread in a small town before this. Even though they had only been there days everyone knew his and Beth's basic story, or as much as the group they had traveled there with did. By the time he reached the door to their apartment his palms were sweaty with nerves.

Daryl ducked inside the room and shook his head to clear his nerves. He looked up and caught a glimpse of Beth standing nervously in the hallway and his breath left his body in a rush at the sight.

Her hair was out of its usual ponytail and twisted up in a knot on the top of her head. He could still see the small braid that she kept in her hair twisted in among it. She was wearing sandals and a short white dress and she tugged at the hem shyly as he looked her from head to toe.

"Sarah brought it over." she explained nervously as she ceased tugging on the hem to cross her arms over her chest sheepishly. "She found it in the closet of their place and thought I might want to go with the traditional color today."

Daryl had to clear his throat before he could respond. "You look beautiful." his voice still sounded chocked as he kept staring at her. She blushed and turned away to grab something from the table next to her but Daryl found he could not tear his eyes away from her to see what it was. He did not think he had ever seen something so breathtaking.

Beth thrust a light blue shirt into his hands and he finally tore his eyes away from her to stare down at the button up in distaste.

"Luke brought that over for you." she said softly, her hands still resting on his. "You don't have to wear it if you don't want to."

Daryl didn't say anything as he pulled away from her to tug his dirty shirt over his head and pull the blue shirt on. The material was tight on his arms but he didn't complain as Beth reached over to button it up for him. As she reached the last one her fingers stilled and she stared up at him. Neither of them said anything for a moment before she pulled away from him and grabbed the rings sitting on the table. The rings had been given to them by other town members who had gone through the jewelry of their apartments previous owners. It seemed as though Winston had not seen any festivities in a long time because everyone was jumping at the chance to help their newest couple get married.

"We should go to the church." Beth said softly as he nodded and took her hand tightly in his.

They walked to the church in a nervous silence, the others in the town following at their heels. Daryl swallowed nervously as they entered the church where he assumed that the entire population of Winston, meager as it was, was already crowded inside the pews.

He exchanged a nervous look with Beth but she squeezed his hand lightly as they walked down the aisle together. They had decided the night before in their meeting with Pastor Clyde that they wanted as little fanfare to the wedding as possible. No piano march, no extensive vows. Although she never mentioned it Daryl was sure that Beth did not want to make the march down the church aisle alone, not without her father there to give her away.

As such, they made their way down the aisle hand in hand, both of their palms slick with sweat. Although the church was crowded Daryl could still feel the empty spaces where their friends and family from the prison should have been. As they neared the vacant front row of pews he allowed himself to imagine that he would look over and see Rick and Carl smiling at him encouragingly or that Beth would be able to reach out her hand and squeeze Maggie's as they made their way to the pastor.

Instead they walked through a church packed with strangers and came to a stop in front of the old pastor in silence. They turned to face each other as he instructed and Daryl caught sight of the empty front pew. He saw the pained look in Beth's eyes and knew she had seen it too. Sadly he squeezed her hand, sighing as she returned the pressure.

In the second row he caught sight of the group that they had traveled here with, Sarah dabbing at her eyes with a kerchief. Luke gave Daryl a thumbs up close to his chest which Daryl responded to with a small nod. The pastor began his speech and Daryl turned to stare into Beth's eyes, one ear tuned to the pastor's melodic voice and the other waiting for Beth to cry out that this was a mistake, that she was not ready for this yet.

Instead he heard her whisper "I do."

Daryl blinked in surprise as she smiled at him shyly and he heard a faint buzzing in his ears as though bees had suddenly filled his brain. Her eyes were wide and bright on his and he found his heart beating faster as the meaning behind her words began to sink in. She had said yes.

Beth had just agreed to be his wife.

Even after talking about it, even after her own suggestion that they get married in Winston, he still felt shocked. He had never before expected to be married because he never though that there would be a woman alive who would want to marry a man like him. And now the kindest, beautifulest, and strongest woman he had ever met just agreed to marry him.

Daryl suddenly realized that Beth was looking at him with a startled fear in his eyes and the buzzing in his ears had stopped. He cast a quick look at the pastor who was looking at him expectantly.

"What?" Daryl asked, unsure of where they were in the ceremony.

He looked back at Beth in time to see her bite her bottom lip to hold down a smile and he heard a snort from the pews that he would have bet money on was Luke.

"Do you take Beth Greene to be your lawfully wedded wife?" Pastor Clyde repeated slowly, Daryl nodding before he had even finished the sentence.

"I do." he meant to say it strongly, loud and sure, to make up for his mistake earlier but instead it came out in a croaked whisper as his voice failed him. Beth beamed as the church erupted in applause and Pastor Clyde began to call out that he could now kiss his bride but by that point Daryl had already pulled her into his arms.

As they pulled away Daryl couldn't help but imagine what his brother would say about him promising to love Beth and only Beth. Merle would have shaken his head and informed Daryl very loudly that he was a fool, that there were so many women in the world he should not be trying to settle himself down with just one. He would tell him that he should just cut her and the kid loose. But then Daryl knew Merle would have pulled him to him roughly in a hug and pounded a hand onto his back. And in that clap would be everything that he was not willing to say out loud, that he was happy for them and that he hoped they were happy.

Daryl shook the thoughts of his brother away as he and Beth turned to face the crowd. After nearly half an hour of shaking hands with strangers who kept calling out congratulations they finally managed to escape the church and head out to their apartment. They managed to keep control of themselves and their hands off of each other just long enough to get to their door at which point Beth had pulled Daryl to her in a passionate embrace.

Now she sat straddling his lap as his hands quickly went to work pulling the white dress off over her head. The moment the dress was clear of her face Beth bent to press her lips to the crook of his neck and Daryl groaned in pleasure, his hands roaming up her bare thighs. For a moment he couldn't help but marvel and the clean sweet scent of her hair and the softness of her skin but then she kissed him next to his ear and he closed his eyes in ecstasy at the feel of her breath.

Cupping the back of her head Daryl turned her face towards him and caught her lips with his own. He ran his tongue lightly over her lips causing her to part them instantly. As the kiss deepened Daryl reached behind her with his free hand and undid the snaps of her bra causing it to fall forward off her chest. She shrugged out of it quickly and leaned forward to press their bare chests against each other. Daryl felt himself harden and as Beth twitched her hips in a curricular motion above him he knew she had felt it too.

Daryl ran his fingers up over her bare side before she leaned back enough for him to cup her breast. Beth moaned against his lips as he rolled her nipple between his thumb and forefinger and his hand tightened in her hair at the sound.

Beth's hands fluttered for a moment on his shoulders before she slid them down his bare chest to wrestle with the button on his pants. Her fingers fumbled for a moment before she managed to pop open the button and he felt her smile into his mouth at the victory.

Beth slid down off his lap to rest on her knees on the floor before him. She hooked her fingers into the waistband of his pants and grinned up at him impishly. Daryl rose his hips off the couch as she slid the cloth down his legs, letting them puddle on the floor around his ankles. His boxers joined them a mere second later and Daryl stared down in awe as Beth rested her hands on each of his thighs before leaning down too take him into her mouth.

His eyes fluttered closed as he groaned, the sweet moist feeling of her mouth around him was like heaven. She swirled her tongue around the tip of his penis, a move she knew drove him crazy, and Daryl let out a low moan his hands moving down to tangle in her hair.

Beth continued her ministrations for a minute before Daryl finally began to tug at her hair. He felt uncomfortably close to finishing and due to some strange sentiment he wanted their first time finishing as a married couple to be together. "Not yet." he whispered as she looked up at him. The sight alone almost sent him over the edge but Beth released him and rose up off her knees to stand before him.

Trying to catch his breath Daryl leaned forward and roamed his hands up over her thighs. Slowly he hooked his fingers in the edge of her panties and slipped them down off her legs. She stepped out of them hastily, adding them to the pile of clothing on the floor.

Her hands on his shoulders Beth put her legs on either side of his and Daryl reached between them to run his thumb over her clit causing her to make a noise deep in the back of her throat. Daryl placed a hand behind her back and pulled her closer towards him as he moved his thumb in slow circles.

Beth reached down and gripped him in her hand and Daryl moved his hands to her hips as she slowly slipped him inside of her. For a moment she stilled on top of him, leaning her forehead down to rest against his as she ran her hands down to grip his biceps.

"I love you." she whispered softly looking down into his eyes.

Daryl moved one of his hands up to tuck a stand of hair behind her ear. "I love you too."

They then lost themselves to the feel of each others bodies. Beth kept her grip of his arms as she moved against him, rotating her hips every few moments in a move that never failed to make Daryl's breath hitch. Her own breath began to get ragged as her movements grew quicker and sloppier against him. Her nails dug into his shoulders and his own fingers clung to her hips and he felt her begin to tighten around him. The feel of it sent him right over the edge with her and she bent to whisper his name against his lips as she quivered in his arms.

For a moment they simply held each other, fighting to gain control over their breath as the euphoria slowly left them. Beth dropped her head against his shoulder and he wrapped his arms tight around her back.

"We're married." she suddenly whispered, her lips brushing against his skin softly. The wondrous amazement in her tone was not lost on him and Daryl felt his breath hitch in equal awe as she pulled away to look down into his eyes.

"Daryl." Beth whispered as she rose her hands to cup his face, her eyes bright and intense on his. "We're _married."_ a smile began to stretch across her lips and Daryl began to smile himself at the sight of it.

"We're married." he agreed wondrously as she bent to kiss him again.


End file.
